A blandly ingratiating sitcom actor named Josh Radnor — the kind of guy who makes Zach Braff looks like Marlon Brando — stars in, writes and directs a movie I loathed, “Happythankyoumoreplease,” a “Singles”-style romantic comedy of remarkable shallowness and an all-consuming affection for cliche. It’s about six cutesy New Yorkers. Radnor, quirky-handsome in the David Schwimmer mold, is a struggling novelist who we’re supposed to adore despite his telling a cute redheaded waitress (Kata Mara) he’s dating that he can never go to hear her cabaret act because he once dated an actress and she was terrible. “What if you suck as a writer?” she asks. “I don’t,” he says. We’ll be the judge of that, son.
The author of a movie that includes two people arguing about NY/LA in beyond-hackneyed points that suggest a tourist’s-level acquaintance with New York (It has culture, have you heard? And restaurants! None of those in LA!) and features many unbearable scenes of Radnor learning about life from the cute l’il black kid he discovers lost on a train — and promptly takes home to live with him (the kid turns out to be an artistic genius and even an expert on how to handle women–file him under Magical Negro, Kindergarten Div.) should take a good look at himself before he gets to bragging.
Among other misbegotten characters are Malin Akerman as a bald chick who suffers from a hair-destroying disease that is supposed to, but does not, make here interesting (why doesn’t she wear a wig instead of rubbing everyone’s faces in it? Mike Nichols does) and which plays no role in the story anyway; and “Arrested Development” nerdling Tony Hale as the doofus who woos Ackerman at the office. She accepts him after he essentially tells her that he’ll be sure to love her beyond all measure if only she’ll consent to a second date. That always works! Nothing turns on a woman like knowing a creepy geek is obsessed with her.
I didn’t laugh once in 100 minutes at the tepid attempts at witty dialogue, which is no more impressive than the routine conversation of the average smug and immensely self-amused twentysomethings.
In the end, you see, the writer dude (he’s the kind of guy who thinks it shows coolness to address other males as “dude”) has only written short stories before, not novels. It’s almost like…he’s got some sort of fear of commitment! Gosh, I hope he gets over that in the company of a bunch of other nice people with knockout smiles and that he’ll work up the courage to go ahead and …see his girlfriend sing at the cabaret. I wanted to leave the theater and get into a margarita after 15 minutes, but for you, the moviegoing public, I stayed seated until the eighteenth jangly alt-rock-backed montage that finally ended the proceedings.