Ellie Kemper and Luke Grimes star in “Happiness for Beginners,” an outdoorsy rom-com that’s inoffensive to a fault.
In Happiness for Beginners,” directed by Vicky Wight, the “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” star Ellie Kemper portrays a divorced 30-something, Helen, on a journey of self-discovery and romance. Wight’s second adaptation of a novel by Katherine Center (after the 2020 drama “The Lost Husband”), the movie trades in warm-and-fuzzy predictability, where the most uprooting event imaginable for Kemper’s character is falling in love with her brother’s best friend, Jake (Luke Grimes), on a group hiking excursion along the Appalachian Trail.
“Happiness for Beginners” is inoffensive to a fault. Its gestures toward comedy largely stem from the ragtag, Patagonia-vested team of hikers surrounding the two lovers. Guided by a zealous leader, Beckett (Ben Cook), the group falls into stock stereotypes — an overconfident hunk, a self-deprecating gay man — who act as a ho-hum Greek chorus to Helen and Jake’s budding relationship. The movie is earnest when it wants to be, like when Jake recites poetry to Helen, but consistently backpedals to jokes about the hikers’ ineptitude and getting freaky in the woods. It’s as if the film is apologizing for its own tenderness.
Kemper and Grimes have enough chemistry to keep the plot afloat, when it doesn’t feel like it’s gingerly treading water. Rather than shooting for the fences in grand gestures or raunchy humor, as so many rom-coms do, “Happiness for Beginners” stays polite. It’s destined to be thrown on in the background of a well-kept Airbnb after a long day of hiking in the Northeast.
Happiness for Beginners
Not rated. Running time: 1 hour 43 minutes. Watch on Netflix.
Source: Movies - nytimes.com
