User Reviews

I watched this without a clue what it was about. But soon after it started, I found myself wondering with bated breath what would happen next, and next, and next, and next. The dialogue was as fresh and colorful as the cast. The direction was steered by a steady hand that knew when to back off and when to tone things down, when to intensify, and how close and to and at what angle the camera should be to the actors. The direction never condescends to its audience as the direction of most romantic comedies do. Nor does this movie smother us with too much wit or too much symbolism. The movie was practically perfect in that it balanced what I think we ask of our comedic dramas: a fresh look at love and humor, believability, and poignancy. It felt so richly human that when it was over I felt that I had watched a new hot play instead of a movie, that's how vivid it was, that's how roughly hewn and real it was.

For those who desperately need some kind of plot-frame before seeing it, I'll give you a jumping off point. It starts with a New York late 20s/early 30s struggling novelist who decides to help a lost boy find his way back home.

I caught the premiere of Happy at the Sundance Film Festival. I'm a huge fan of Josh Radnor (best known for his role as Ted Mosby on the CBS series, How I Met Your Mother), but remained a little skeptical going in since this is a first-time film for him. I was pleasantly surprised! This movie is so charming; I couldn't help falling in love with all of the characters. I was especially impressed by Tony Hale's endearing performance as Sam #2, who tries to win the affection of Annie (Malin Akerman), a woman with Alopecia who struggles with the idea of someone being so smitten with her. Mary Catherine (Zoe Kazan) and Charlie (Pablo Schreiber) are absolutely adorable together and have an unbeatable on screen chemistry. They are at a crossroads in their relationship as Charlie tries to sell Mary Catherine on the idea of leaving their home in New York to move to L.A.

Sam (Josh Radnor), Mississippi (Kate Mara) and Rasheen (Michael Algieri) round out the cast of characters. Mississippi is a cabaret singer who catches the eye of Sam early in the film and while their hesitation to throw caution to the wind and go for each other is annoying at times, it brings a much-needed realism over romance approach to their relationship.

Rasheen was an audience favorite and his role adds a unique piece to this puzzle, playing a foster boy separated from his family on the subway who is rescued and looked after by Sam. It is truly an enjoyable highlight of the film to watch their interactions as they grow from perfect strangers to close friends. An amazing dynamic is brought to the script through their friendship, but not without Rasheen's life before Sam looming in the distance.

If this movie is any indication of Josh's talent as a writer, I can't wait to see more of his work. It contains all of the elements of a romantic comedy, yet manages to completely avoid the clichés and predictability that are typically found in this genre. It is clever, heartwarming, hopeful and hilarious. I wouldn't be surprised if it becomes the big hit of Sundance 2010. Congratulations to Josh and everyone behind this film!

What a movie....what a movie..... I must say I'm a big fan of Josh Radnor because of his hit series "How I met your mother" and (who isn't?) I think as a writer he is amazing and he has a long way to go. He has mentioned his love for short stories unknowingly in the TV show many times and I must say his endeavour has never gone unnoticed. Josh Radnor has a real potential. He just brought it together and the rest was obvious. The writing was superb(I'm a writer myself so bro Respect!) and not to forget the brilliant direction done by Josh himself.

A wonderful debut, by the way, as a director for him and all the very best wishes to him for his future ventures. Awesome acting and some great performances by the cast that included Malin Akerman (as usual she is brilliant in this flick too), Kate Mara (I'm beginning to like her already)and Zoe Kazan(with her sweet role which she generally plays quite naturally).

The story was wonderful. Gotta watch it to know it. I'd give it a 7 on 10 and I think the flick deserved it. I'd recommend everyone to go and watch this one because it certainly is worth all the accolades.

There seems to be a new kind of dramedy-type storytelling, and we liked what we saw in HappyThankYouMorePlease. Write off asking yourself why some of the characters did what they did; if you burden yourself with trying to understand their logic as the stories unfold, you may get too frustrated with one or more characters. Just embrace the film, as the characters will eventually answer the questions you've been asking.

At first I was a little confused with the way the stories were intertwined, but by allowing them to unfold, I truly began to empathize with almost everyone in the film. I understand that it's a "coming-of-age" flick. But the way the characters portrayed themselves and interacted with each other, I grew to enjoy everyone. And don't be gun-shy about another COA flick (even as they are being so played out, it seems).

The difference to me, was how the characters acted towards each other. There seemed to be a decent bit of ad-libbing that helps bring down the guard of a skeptical viewer. There were good friends that seemed like they were long-time friends who happened to get together to make this film. I found myself rooting for each main character. The photography was nice, the writing and acting were special. Direction was very sensitive to people who are complicated in their goals of streamlining their lives. I empathized with them as they had to confront their adversities (or, themselves). The deduction I gave was for feeling a bit confused during the first part of the film. By its end, I was very satisfied.

This is an excellent "slice of life" movie, very easy to relate to and entertaining. It manages to be optimistic without being saccharine sweet. The writer/director, while male, depicts women characters with compassion and understanding. And New York in summer feels like the real thing, in a way that the best Woody Allen films do. Most impressive and enjoyable, though, are the performances. Malin Ackerman has never been better. Tony Hale is a revelation! Josh is excellent (and nothing like Ted Mosby). The little boy, Michael Algieri, is a natural. And Kate Mara -- omg! Not only is she gorgeous, funny and engaging, she's an amazing singer!! Watching her one feels a star being born. The songs by Jaymay -- which are the movie's score -- are perfect. And tech credits (cinematography, editing, production design) are fantastic.

Greetings again from the darkness. If such a thing existed in Hollywood, I wouldn't be surprised if Woody Allen brought a Trademark Infringement suit against writer/director Josh Radnor. There is even a clear reference to Mr. Allen, who must be one of Radnor's idols. Of course, similar ideas and approaches happen frequently in movies, so really what we have is a snapshot in time of what it's like to be a young (late 20's to early 30's) New Yorker trying to figure out life.

Radnor is one of the stars of "How I Met Your Mother" and this is his filmmaking debut. He does show some promise despite some weakness in the script and too dang many close-ups - talking heads, as I call them. His goal was to take an intimate look at relationships and the road to maturity, which is often filled with potholes. This seems especially true for those artistic types who are convinced New York is the only land of opportunity in existence.

There are 4 stories going on: Sam (Josh Radnor) is a struggling writer who meets Mississippi (Kate Mara), a cabaret singer/waitress; Mary Catherine (Zoe Kazan) and Charlie (Pablo Schreiber) have their relationship tested by a proposed move to L.A.; Annie (Malin Akerman) suffers from a self-image problem and faces off against a true romantic in Sam #2 (Tony Hale); and an on-going interwoven story line involves Sam's character making an asinine decision when a young boy gets separated from his family on the subway.

The best of the stories is Annie's. Suffering from an auto-immune disease which leaves her hairless, she has a real self-image problem in thinking that she is not worthy of love. On the ironic other hand, she is put off by the advances of nice guy Sam #2 because he isn't the physical specimen she had dreamed of. Akerman and Hale make these characters believable and we actually pull for them to figure it out.

Kazan's Mary Catherine just had me hoping Charlie would slap her and take off to LA on his own. Kazan (granddaughter of the great director Elia Kazan) actually does a nice job capturing the suffering that so many females put themselves through. Kate Mara's Mississippi is the perky on the outside, defensive on the inside type who should probably never get mixed up with the self-centered mess that is Sam (Radnor). Still, Mara's talent is on full display (she first leaped off the screen in Brokeback Mountain as Heath Ledger's 19 yr old daughter).

One thing the script reminds us is that this generation still believes the world revolves around their every decision. They have been a bit slow on the uptake here, but it makes for easy pickings in script writing. There are some terrific individual scenes, but some of the larger plot lines are not treated fairly or completely. Maybe Radnor tackled a bit too much for his first outing. Still, a decent effort and I look forward to more from him.

It appears that Josh Radnor's hopeless romantic "How I Met Your Mother" character Ted Mosby has rubbed off on his other ambitions. His debut film, "happythankyoumoreplease" is a bit more realistic than the hit sitcom, but both involve a great deal of optimism.

Following various relationship dynamics between six connected New Yorkers, Radnor is not-so-subtly inspired by Woody Allen, whom he references in the film quite clearly without naming him directly. To compare Radnor's film with Allen's body of work, however, would very clearly result in one major fundamental difference: Radnor is not pessimistic.

Radnor stars as Sam Wexler, a struggling writer (yup) on the precipice of 30 who by chance notices a young boy (Michael Algieri) get separated from what appears to be his family while on the subway. Sam feels inclined to help, but after a certain point (around when he learns the boy is a foster child who clearly didn't like his living situation) realizes he can't shake him off and takes him in. Around this time, a nearby bartender/server (Kate Mara) catches his eye.

The film also follows Sam's closest friend, Annie (Malin Akerman), a woman with alopecia struggling to find love, as well as his cousin Mary Catherine (Zoe Kazan) and her boyfriend Charlie (Pablo Schreiber), who confront the possibility of uprooting their lives and moving to Los Angeles.

The characters' problems are very realistic, though not necessarily interesting. Sam's relationship with the boy, Rasheen, has the most potential because Rasheen is not the typical surprisingly mature wise- alec kid we're normally treated to in adult films involving unlikely friendships between a child and adult. But Radnor is also interested in the other relationship dynamics in his script, so that one story doesn't get quite the attention it might have ideally received.

Radnor's writing is very conscious of cliché, a necessity given the stories--especially the romances--have a natural trajectory toward predictable. And even though there's little reason given as to why Mara's Mississippi is interested in Sam, Radnor makes their exchanges too cute for their entire subplot to turn sour. The implication is these are two troubled young people looking for love, willing to go out on a limb to find it. That is just one of the many really sweet notions Radnor wishes to convey through this film.

"Happythankyoumoreplease" never delves into especially dramatic territory. The characters hit major bumps and hardships, but more of the sentimental variety, the kind that evoke audience empathy by trying to relate to everyone. Nothing out of the ordinary happens in the movie; Radnor just wants his audience to connect with the problems of the characters and consider the shifts in perspective they experience.

It's a pleasant film that really plays it safe, and those movies have their place. People hoping to be stirred by some seriously thought- provoking interpersonal dilemmas will be disappointed, but the title should be a giveaway that this one's an uplifting indie. The characters and their situations feel real, and it's enough to keep the film interesting until it finishes with a soft, moment-of-clarity/all is right in the universe climax.

I would definitely keep an eye on Radnor's work going forward. There are far worse labels than an optimistic Woody Allen minus the neuroses.

~Steven C

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Being one of the most talked about films coming out of Sundance earlier this year, "Happythankyoumoreplease" made it's way to the Gen Art film festival and was presented as their opening night feature. Having heard all the buzz surrounding this film and usually enjoying most of the bigger films that come out of Sundance, I was very intrigued to see the film. Did the movie live up to the buzz or was it just overkill, continue reading to read my opinion on the film.

"Happythankyoumoreplease" features a talented and fresh cast of people. The basic premise of the film features the current generation of 20 somethings who live in NY. The story focuses on several characters and their battles with growing up, understanding how the world works, and ultimately what it means to fall in love with the right person for them. This interesting and feel good film was told by Josh Radnor, who not only directed but wrote the film.

The best way to describe "Happythankyoumoreplease" is a mainstream film with an independent budget. While the movie itself didn't really have an independent feel to it, I would say it did have some elements that made it feel "indie" so to speak. The well established actors and actresses in the film, a storyline that was very crowd pleasing, and overall pretty typical characters made it feel mainstream. However, the amount of character development along with some of the characters such as Malin Akerman's character Annie are the elements that gave it a more independent feel.

Like most good independent films, the well written characters and the actors who played them were the highlight of this film. Having never seen a single episode of "How I Met Your Mother" I was totally unaware of who Josh Radnor was and I was totally honest with him about it when I met him later in the evening. What he did with this film was good especially for a first time director and writer plus I give him even more kudos points for starring in the film as well.

The script, which as noted above was written by Radnor, is actually decent especially with mixing independent elements with mainstream elements. Some of the characters were rather typical such as Mississippi played by the talented Kate Mara and Sam #2 played by Tony Hale. These two characters felt like they were directly out of every movie you have seen in the past. Mississippi is the beautiful and talented singer who keeps falling for the wrong guy and then Tony Hale is the dork with the heart of gold. These characters aren't as deep as say Radnor's character Sam or Alkerman's Emma because these characters are just well written characters with a lot of depth. I will also have to point out that little Michael Algieri is a total scene stealer. Guarantee almost every woman who sees this film will fall in love with the kid. He is just adorable and his storyline, although it was not really fleshed out as much as I would like, was fairly interesting. All in all I felt everyone in the film played their roles well I just felt certain characters had more depth and others were too clichéd so to speak.

The overall message the film as I said was a feel good one. You knew where this film was going within the first 10 minutes and you knew exactly what was going to happen. The simplistic storyline was really the main thing that urked me about it. You had so many great lead actors and actresses and I felt the direction it took was just the typical one. I expected some stunners here and there but didn't get them despite in the beginning feeling like it was going to be a tad out of the ordinary. I cant really knock it too much though because I enjoyed it and really didn't feel it dragged at all. I guess I was just expecting more. I guess what I was expecting was the next "(500) Days of Summer" but this film wasn't it.

In conclusion, "Happythankyoumoreplease" won the audience award at the Gen Art film festival and the reason it won was because it was a crowd pleaser. This isn't an original work of art but its a fun little film with a talented cast and a simplistic overall story. The actors and the character development make it more worthy then most multiple character films similar to it but I still expected more from it than what I got. I guess for a first time writer and director its a good start and I think this film will do fairly well when it hits the local multiplexes later in the year.

MovieManMenzel's final rating for "Happythankyoumoreplease" is a 7 out of 10.

I adored this film, it was one of my favorites at Sundance, and the cast & crew were amazingly sweet people. The film is a trio of intertwined stories involving six New Yorkers dealing with the complexities of love, friendship and identity. While this premise may sound familiar, its charm is refreshing and its character keeps the film from becoming just another romantic comedy. The main story focuses on Sam Wexler, a struggling writer (Radnor ), who, during a particularly bad day when he encounters a young boy (played by the adorable Michael Algieri) who's been separated from his family. When the boy reveals that he is unhappy in foster care, Sam decides to bring the boy back to his apartment, and a unique friendship begins to develop between the two. This friendship both initiates and complicates Sam's romance with a beautiful cabaret singer named Mississippi (Kate Mara). I really recommend this film. I can't wait for it to be released in theaters so my friends and family can see it.

As someone who enjoys shameless chick flicks and Josh Radnor, but is also a Sundance enthusiast, I really wanted to like this film. The storyline was fine, the music by Jaymay was awesome, the actors are all decent.

That being said, it was totally apparent that Radnor is still an amateur at writing and directing. You know how, in high school, when your friend asked you to read their angsty poetry, and it took all of you not to roll your eyes? That's what watching this movie was kind of like.

There was so much contrived drama that it would have been better suited to a soap opera or comedy. Instead, the actors had to take a superficially dramatic script and try to wring some drama out of it. For instance, the movie starts off with a one-night-stand leaving Radnor's apartment just as he wakes up and realizes he is late for an interview. Conveniently, his best friend leaves a voicemail as he's getting ready, as if she would know he were there listening, perfectly timed to tell him to tuck his shirt in right as he finishes dressing. But it's not a comedy! It's just trying to be clever. He ends up speaking with her on the phone and says something like, "Why did I oversleep? Why am I so afraid of success?" This sounds exactly like what some screen writing student would think that a self-pitying artist would say. The rest of the movie moves conveniently along these lines: things a screen writing student THINKS his characters would say. Unfortunately, film enthusiasts will be unsurprised by every line fed to them from here on out.

Rasheen's character was great and would have made this a promising movie if only his presence in the plot was not based on some ridiculous presence.

I'm curious to see what Radnor will do next, but he'd probably be wise to work on short films and practice the art of delighting the audience in as little time as possible before attempting a longer format again.

This film is about several youthful friends in New York in search of happiness in their love lives.

"Happythankyoumoreplease" is a refreshing comedy drama about contemporary people. Each of the main characters is different in many ways, and yet they are united by their search for love. It is an upbeat and positive film without being silly or over-sweet. It is welcoming to see Malin Ackerman finally having a credible role, and she shines as a woman whose appearance is different. I like the way she brings up gratitude, and if gratitude is made a prominent theme in the film (which could easily fit into the film's existing plot), it would have been even more engaging and positive.

"I was a well-fed, middle-class kid who came from good parents; I've got no material." Those words, spoken by Sam the writer, are just one example of how Josh Radnor blurs the lines between writer and character in his debut film, happythankyoumoreplease.

In it, we follow the lives of a few late-20s/early-30s bachelors and bachelorettes in New York City, a place Radnor portrays endearingly. Sam (played by Radnor) is a cynical writer desperately trying to sell one of his short stories. His best friend Anne (Malin Akerman) can't seem to stop dating the wrong guys. His cousin Mary (Zoe Kazan) is pressured by her boyfriend to go to Los Angeles (a city she loathes) and leave New York (the city she calls home). Along the way we meet all sorts of characters, including Rasheen, a "young black child" who, after shuffling through several foster families, has no home.

Sam takes Rasheen in for awhile, at least until he can figure out what to do with him. Anne accuses him of using the boy for material, but it's more complicated than that. Although we've seen the little-kid-sidekick device before, it's so lightheartedly entertaining here that we really don't care. Michael Algieri's debut as Rasheen will steal your heart.

I have yet to mention Mississippi, a bartender/cabaret singer, played by the lovely Kate Mara, who serves as Sam's romantic conflict. They hit it off quickly, possibly too quickly, and we wonder if they've met at the wrong time. Regardless, their interactions are the most cringe-worthy of the film (see: "let's clean each other up" and "you write short stories, I'm ready for the novel").

On the other hand, great music from Jaymay kept me in tune with the film's title. It serves as a narrative soundtrack for happythankyoumoreplease and gives it an indie feel (the film won the Audience Award for Best Drama at Sundance).

Although at times cheesy and clichéd, Radnor's debut tells an epigrammatic story about characters we genuinely care about. Sam's not delivering a profound revelation when he says "every five years I realize what an asshole I was five years ago." Yet the inherent modesty in that statement says a lot about Radnor's work.

I had enjoyed Josh Radnor's second film 'Liberal Arts' so thought I'd give this one a go too.

Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with this film. It's a passable hour and a bit,with some nice tender moments and humour along the way.

However, it just didn't grab me in the same way that 'Liberal Arts' did. I didn't engage with the characters as much and apart from the story featuring Radnor himself I didn't enjoy parts of the film.

I was also put off by the amount of bad language within the film. I think there were elements of swearing for the sake of it.

Overall, a decent film. Nothing special.

Based on the plot line, six New Yorkers juggle love and friendship, and the fact that it is written and directed by and starring Josh Radnor of "How I Met Your Mother" fame, one could easily assume that "Happythankyoumoreplease" is a 3-part episode of "Friends" on the big screen. Surprisingly, that's not it at all. The humour is in the dialogue, not the situations.

Yes, it is about New Yorkers juggling love and friendship as they struggle with maturity and who they are as people, but on top of all of that, there's a story. There's actually a pretty good reason why this is the week that we look in on their lives. Sam (Josh Radnor) is on the verge of actually becoming a published writer, but then he meets a kid, and then a girl. The girl is Mississippi (Kate Mara) and she's the type of girl that makes you want to drop everything in your life and become the man that she would want you to be. The number of things that are wrong with that statement is exactly what makes the brilliant subtle thoughtfulness in this film so great.

I'm usually not one for trendy, snappy, unnatural dialogue, especially if it's unrealistic like "Juno" or "Easy A", but here, it's just so much more reasonable for the characters, and way funnier. There are a lot of elements that aren't particularly original, but it's also good-humoured, playful and clever enough that it all works. And, yes, I was happy at the end. Thank you. More, please?

Josh Radnor seems to understand the quirks and eccentric qualities of white people the way Tyler Perry understands deeper nature of black people. Both filmmakers have their flaws - one makes a great deal of the story too unbelievable while the other makes a great deal of the story overwrought and overly-sentimental - but both men succeed on some difficult levels of filmmaking.

Radnor's directorial debut, confusingly titled Happythankyoumoreplease, is ostensibly another piece of "hipster cinema" that exists in the same light as Zach Braff's Garden State or Marc Webb's (500 Days) of Summer. Radnor undoubtedly has a few things similar to the aforementioned films (they feature characters with lives too quirky and arty to be believable and seem to carry the mindset that one off-the-wall woman could change it all), but there's believable humanization done in the film. It's a little bit Woody Allen, a little bit modern independent cinema, and a little bit of Radnor's sitcom style that indisputably comes from his work on How I Met Your Mother.

With all that artiness, the film shouldn't work, but sort of does. It focuses on three relationships, all of which developed to some considerable extent. The first, and best, involves Radnor himself as Sam, a struggling freelance writer who meets a young black child named Rasheen (Michael Algieri) on the subway. At first, Rasheen's dialog is confined to short, fragmented statements and the boy rarely answers Sam's question, which are asked in a very dictative manner. As time goes on, we see Rasheen's social comfortableness around Sam comes out not in a more loquacious manner, but in a more relaxed manner, lacking the apprehensive questionable tone he uses when he first meets Sam.

Moreover, Sam decides since he couldn't leave Rasheen out in public in good conscious, he takes him in, briefly, at his small apartment in upstate New York. On the way there with the kid he meets Mississippi (Kate Mara), an attractive redhead who works at a bar and sings whenever she gets the opportunity. Sam and Mississippi try to maintain a platonic relationship for the time being, but it gets complicated with Rasheen in the picture and Sam's opposition to seeing Mississippi perform because he had a relationship in the past that was burdened when he discovered the woman he was with had no discernible talent.

The following romantic plot involves Annie (Malin Åkerman), an Alopecia patient (the kind that throws "Alopecia awareness parties"), who claims to Sam that she dates "twenty-nine-year-old twelve-year-olds" when describing their maturity level. When trying to carry a relationship with directionless weirdos, she finds herself always the conversation buddy of another Sam (Tony Hale), who works two floors above her. She will inevitably earn the value of the "don't judge a book by its cover" rule soon enough.

And then there's Sam's cousin Mary Catherine (Zoe Kazan) and her boyfriend Charlie (Pablo Schreiber), a couple struggling to think about whether they should leave New York City and reside in California or stay confined to the land they know best.

Any cinephile can see that Radnor is trying Woody Allen's romantic uncertainty style on for size. One could even identify that in his sophomore effort Liberal Arts. At one point, a character regards how another character has moved completely out of focus to the point of being an abstract figure. This is a direct reference to one of Allen's darkest and most forgotten pictures, Deconstructing Harry. At one point, another character regards a man who is great but makes too many movies. She questions why he needs to make one a year and not one every other year. She too mentions that he should spend time with his wife, who is also his daughter. She is also nearly blackout drunk.

While possessing scenes that work because of their strong depictions of young relationships (the scenes with Sam and Mississippi are terrific as well as the scenes featuring Sam and Rasheen), Happythankyoumoreplease struggles with making each of its stories interesting. The Sam and Mississippi relationship works right off the bat because of both characters' evident chemistry and smiley personalities. Annie's relationship with Sam (nicknamed Sam #2) is strong because it hits deeper heights than many films focusing on one full-length relationship do (consider the scene when the two sit down for a surprisingly meaningful talk at a restaurant). The relationship that feels dry and archetypal is between Mary Catherine and Charlie's, but perhaps that's intentional. They are the youngest couple in the film, and that childish naivety seems to still linger above them like a raincloud on an overcast day. Kazan and Schreiber's chemistry is often flat and unremarkable, but both actors show at least an interest in their characters just by the way they exercise their quirks to each other.

Happythankyoumoreplease has the power to deeply resonate with an audience and completely alienate and irritate the other. I was taken by the way it carried these three relationships almost zealously, and applaud Radnor for making his first film a moderately-ambitious, crafty project. He would later make Liberal Arts, as previously mentioned, a small gem but a great one at that, that subtly tackled the problem of useless passions and age-gaps in relationships. Radnor will hopefully continue to be a poet for the young, and I'll be damned if the young couldn't use enough of them. Don't swear.

I watched this stunningly empty piece of vanity celluloid from Josh Radnor, one of the How I Met Your Mother guys. I guess he had so much money on his hands that he thought he might as well follow his ambition to be a filmmaker. I can only hope he got it out of his system.

I keep imagining Radnor watching Garden State, thinking, "I can do that!"

No, apparently you can't.

Y'know, I chuckle when people on IMDb use superlatives to describe every pedestrian film that comes down the pike, but this is one time it may indeed be appropriate. Happythankyoumoreplease is one of the worst movies I've ever seen. It is scary bad. It is offensively bad. It is a lot of young beautiful people trying to act as though their lives have meaning and import, but not one of them has experienced a genuine challenge yet in life. Neither as characters, nor, judging from the insufferable pettiness of the performances, as actual human beings. I don't wish evil or hardship to befall them, except to say, it would make them far more believable and substantive as artists.

I'm just sorry Pablo Schreiber and Kate Mara got mixed up in this mess.

I think my title sums up my feelings. I was bored throughout the film and the cliche elements made me want to quit the film several times. Some of the "deep" scenes were downright cringey and laughable. It was trying so hard to be different but it was just so... predictable. I'm sorry but I really don't see what other people see in this film. I honestly felt that this was a waste of my time. Having a few diverse characters and mostly boring storylines does not make a good movie in my opinion.

If you live the life in films that I do, you will be offended when a filmmaker takes his responsibilities lightly. That is what I felt when watching this.

The writer of the thing has made himself the central character: a writer who has trouble producing a long form work and instead creates short stories.

He (the filmmaker) thinks he can get away with giving us three small stories instead of a real film. The central precedent of course is Altman's 'Short Cuts' made into a subgenre by Anderson. But those men worked on a long form where characters and situations were simply split among several actors. What we have here is three half hour short stories about relationships.

The irony of the thing is that there ate two folds referencing this inadequacy (seen as an acceptable narrative strategy). The first of course is the many references to the on-screen writer (and indeed all the male love interests) to work in long form.

The second is a juvenile who plays mo role whatever except to produce amazing small artworks that we are supposed to accept as genuine art.

I must admit that the craft is well executed. Sequences are tied by songs of the sort sung by one of the (supposedly endearing) characters. There are a lot of feel-good buttons pressed here and the . But the overall effect is that the filmmaker has a superficial understanding of love and story (which means love).

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.

..for this really great movie. I had no idea what this movie was about. Just saw the Cover and went for it. I am really not the biggest fan of love stories and if i would have known before i guess i may not have watched this movie ;) But it was something really refreshing. manly fresh faces who in my eyes had really fun to come together for this movie. I hoped it wont stop, but now it did i wish there will be no "part 2" as we all know where this road will go ;) So i spare you all the details, just go and see something else, dive into the lives of some friendly NY people! (But now i have to write more lines to make it fit the 10 Line's Limit although i said all i wanted to say. I feel like Sam Nr.1 trying to squeeze a story out. i thought about deleting my useless comment but i only come here when i liked a movie very much, so i decided to stay and finish these lines!)

This is the debut film of Josh Radnor. I saw it at the Gasparilla Film Festival and really liked it. The producer, Jesse talked about the positive message that the film tries to convey about simply trying until you succeed This movie is a warm story of young people struggling with relationships in New York City. In the end, the character resolve most of their relationship issues and the ending is satisfying. This story was told with heart and warmth.

Josh Radnor did a great job both as a director and as the leading actor. The girl with the autoimmune disorder felt she was unlovable. The man who wins her over does so by convincing her that she deserves to be loved. This is a universal message that is not told enough in movies.

I've been watching HIMYM for years now and was really curious to see this film. But apart from its title which made me even more curious I'm not impressed. The story didn't succeed in keeping my attention. Repeatedly I realized that I was busy with my phone catching up on emails or reading something on IMDb or playing scrabble - at some point I got so annoyed with the background jabbering (movie) that I turned it off. So in short I was so bored that I didn't even make it through the movie. The characters are just boring, we've seen their problems already so often. The colors of the film were boring, the camera was sometimes interesting but not interesting enough for me to be able to ignore the script. Judging from the official reviews and being the same age as Josh Radnor I thought this would be a movie that I could relate to but no.

It's too bad because like I said before I was really excited to see it.