Happy Ever Afters

I enjoyed Happy Ever Afters very much. We went to a mother's day preview screening and my mum loved it and wants to bring her friends now. I hadn't seen any trailer beforehand and had no idea what to expect but it really was a pleasant surprise. There was a good atmosphere in the cinema, plenty of laughing out loud. It's funny and touching at times too. Great acting overall, particularly from Sally Hawkins and Tom Riley. The smaller characters were good too and the little girl who plays Sally's daughter is hilarious, steals every scene she's in. We overheard other audience members after saying they enjoyed it too. I'd definitely recommend it to friends. A great feel good movie.

In the years after September 11 2001 the world, its peoples its institutions its joys its arts, went into meltdown. unable to to see a clear future,people governments artist & film makers alike fumbled in the ash cloud of broken dreams and shattered ideologies, in the attempt of re-councling the shards of faith and hope and humanity, still left on this lonely planet. Few films clam as much responsibility for assembling so many parts of our broken society as this.

happily ever afters is story of many parts.some are sharp and painful to touch (or even to look at) some more, colourful and hilarious. what this film (or piece of art) is, is a gathering of these seemingly ill-fitting and disparate pieces and a transformation of them into a cathedral window. A beautiful whole, made from broken shards,fitted together with the honesty of the artist lead.

It is no coincidence that this film debuted in the same year that Barack Hussein Obama became the 44th President of the United States of American having run his campaign under the banner of 'hope'.the world was ready for change and the time for change is felt by true leaders and artist. like Barack Obama this film may not heal our tired and battered souls and shelter us from the hard rain but it sure as heaven can gives us hope!

PS:it should have got an Oscar, and i don't think it was even nominated.

peace and love

Wonderful, relaxing, a bit crazy. This movie is great. I can't believe how underrated it is. Normally, I'd have given it a 9, but I chose 10 to rise up it's mark a little.

The plot - twisted, crazy, chaotic. And this is exactly what makes this movie so great. The characters - I just fell in love with them. They're so witty and spiritual. At the end, I was thinking 'Oh common....no one acts like that; no one, after all that, keeps having fun; ...but actually, it would be SO nice if people were like that...'

I think beneath all the chaotic stuff that happens throughout the movie, there is a very simple idea: you just have to take life as it is and enjoy every second of it.

I rented this last night to watch with my partner and mother-in-law.

It is utter rubbish. From the corny music, to the very poorly executed 'comedy of errors' acting/editing, to the completely disengaging male lead (he spends a good deal of the film sighing and fumbling for words, but not in a well timed way) this film is completely egregious from beginning until about 20 minutes in when we turned it off and watched 'Everybody's Fine' instead (which by the way, is amazing).

We rented this from our Apple TV, and at one point I did consider penning an email to Steve Jobs to outline my disgust at it being added to the line-up on there.

I really wanted to like and enjoy this movie, but it's just not terribly good, all in all. I liked pretty much all the actors, and would like to see them in other, better movies. (I'd particularly like to see the actress playing *I think* Karen, Maura's sister or close friend; her character gets somewhat dropped in the course of the movie.) This movie was just so disjointed and ridiculous; disjointed and ridiculous is not a deal-breaker for me, but it has to work, and this just didn't. One indication of how negative an impression this made on me is reflected in what I just wrote in the message section: The element that most stood out for me in this middling little movie was the ridiculous inconsistency of the hair on Sally Hawkins' head. I'm not one of those people who generally notice goofs and screw-ups in continuity, but this was so 'in your face,' even I couldn't miss it.

Even within many little scenes, from shot to shot, her hairstyle changes. Sometimes it's fairly natural looking, with a part on her left side, the bangs falling in a few segments, and the entire shape not terribly big; sometimes it's kind of like that, but with a slightly larger shape, probably from teasing yielding a bit more 'lift'; sometimes it's kind of like that, but the hair darker and more smoothed, sometimes with the bangs all sticking together in one piece; sometimes there's no part at all; and there's one point (while Maura and Freddy are outside looking for Molly, who ends up being up in a tree) where the hair appears to be a helmet-y, yucky looking wig (no part there, either).

It got to be really annoying; couldn't help wondering why no one could be bothered trying to keep any kind of continuity in that element. In that scene where she particularly seems to be wearing a wig, I was taken out of the story again, wondering if these shots were filmed much later than the rest, and maybe Sally H. had cut all her hair off, so they had to use a wig and didn't have time to get a good one, and get it styled right. Just so sloppy (kind of like the run-on sentence I just typed). Too bad, but at least it's not a great movie otherwise either, in which case it would have been a real shame.