Happy Endings

An ensemble cast telling 3 stories with intertwining 10 characters. One story is about a father and son who are dating the same woman. Another features a woman who long ago gave her baby up for adoption but is now being blackmailed by a documentary filmmaker who claims to know the now-grown child's whereabouts. Happy Endings is a wildly original and supremely self-conscious comedy by a filmmaker, Don Roos, who clearly embraces the complexity and ambivalence of modern life. If you thought you knew all about love, relationships, and contemporary American families, guess again. Roos will further enlighten and entertain you in this often hilarious and always compelling treatise on our mercurial day-to-day existence. With its exorbitant wit and nonstop surprises, Happy Endings combines original storytelling with original stories that fundamentally question our presumptions about the way real America lives. The multiple narrative lines include a filmmaker blackmailing a woman about a son she long ago gave up for adoption; a gay man whose partner was, or perhaps wasn't, the sperm donor for two of their best friends, a lesbian couple; and a 30-something girl who shacks up with a young man trying to convince his father he's straight and then moves on to the dad. In other words, Happy Endings is a true feast of secrets, missed opportunities, and second chances. Roos is a modern American Brecht with unsurpassed comic sensibility and insight. Aided by a fantastic ensemble cast that features Lisa Kudrow, Jesse Bradford, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and a great turn by Tom Arnold, and by a brilliant use of title cards, Roos is a filmmaker in complete control of his art, who understands that happy endings aren't always what you expect.— Geoffrey Gilmore (from www.sundance.org) Director's Bio: Don Roos is the screenwriter of Love Field, Single White Female, Boys on the Side, and the 1996 remake of Diabolique. In 1998 he made his directorial debut with The Opposite of Sex, which won two Independent Spirit Awards for best first feature and best screenplay. In 2000 he directed Ben Affleck and Gwyneth Paltrow in Bounce, which he also wrote.