SALON

Friday, Mar 4, 2011 6:26 PM UTC

“Happythankyoumoreplease”: “How I Met Your Mother” star’s likable film debut

Josh Radnor turns auteur with the genial NYC ensemble comedy "Happythankyoumoreplease"

By

Topics: Happythankyoumoreplease, Sundance Film Festival, Woody Allen, Movies,

A still from "Happythankyoumoreplease"

A genial combination of mid-period Woody Allen romantic neurosis and, say, “He’s Just Not That Into You,” “Happythankyoumoreplease” marks the writing and directing debut of Josh Radnor, the star of TV’s “How I Met Your Mother.” It’s not an event that will go down in cinema history, exactly, but Radnor offers an entertaining and not especially self-indulgent ensemble comedy about young love in the big city that spotlights an appealing cast of youthful fringe-of-Hollywood talent.

Radnor himself plays Sam Wexler, a scruffy wannabe novelist who’s pushing 30 and who, like a lot of people in this kind of movie, lives in a non-terrible Manhattan apartment with no visible means of support. Sam’s big meeting with a high-powered editor (Richard Jenkins, who seems to be contractually obligated to appear in every mid-budget independent film) and his pursuit of a comely waitress-chanteuse named Mississippi (Kate Mara) are interrupted by his accidental custodianship of a near-silent little kid (Michael Algieri) who’s gotten separated from his caretaker on the subway. Since the kid is virtually the only nonwhite person who gets to speak a line in the entire movie, we’re dangerously close to Magical Negro territory here. But Radnor is such a comfortable and gentle comic persona — like a nicer Jerry Seinfeld, mixed with bits of Buster Keaton — that he pretty well pulls the movie out of the fire.

There isn’t all that much tension or heat around the budding romance between Sam and Mississippi, although both Radnor and Mara are easy on the eyes. But Sam’s lovelorn friend Annie (the immensely likable Malin Akerman), who wears hippie-flavored head wraps because she has alopecia and consistently picks the wrong guys because she has low self-esteem, is a terrific character. Zoe Kazan and Pablo Schreiber inhabit what you might call the C-level plot, as a couple who can’t decide whether to break up or stay together, to put down roots in New York or move to L.A. Radnor’s script is competent and mildly amusing — even if the whole subplot about the lost black kid stretches credibility to the breaking point — and I think he’s a promising director. “Happythankyoumoreplease” is crisply structured, never boring or pretentious, and will keep you watching right to its predictably charming interlinked conclusions. Yeah, I think the title is awful and irritating too. But admit it: Once you’ve heard it and absorbed it, you won’t forget it.

“Happythankyoumoreplease” is now playing in many major cities, with wider national release to follow.

 

Andrew O

More Andrew O'Hehir.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 6 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Oklahoma senator: Tornado aid “totally different” from Sandy aid
3071 points3072 points | 2343 comments
vote
Anyone Regret Slashing National Weather Service Budget Now?: With GOP-backed cuts to forecasting agency, experts warn future storms will go undetected and more lives lost
1025 points1026 points | 543 comments
vote
Oklahoma senator wants to offset tornado aid with other cuts
152 points153 points | 60 comments
vote
Horrifying new trend: Posting rapes to Facebook " In Chicago this weekend, prosecutors announced three teenaged boys will tried as adults for aggravated criminal sexual assault after allegedly raping a 12-year-old girl — and posting a video of the attack on Facebook."
30 points31 points | 15 comments
vote
New campaign compares gun control to anti-LGBT discrimination
27 points28 points | 11 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations