''Welcome to Happiness'' is a 2015 American

comedy film A comedy film is a category of film which emphasizes humor. These films are designed to make the audience laugh through amusement. Films in this style traditionally have a happy ending (black comedy being an exception). Comedy is one of the ol ...

written and directed by Oliver Thompson and starring

Kyle Gallner Kyle Steven Gallner (born October 22, 1986) is an American actor. He is known for his portrayal of Cassidy "Beaver" Casablancas in the television series ''Veronica Mars'', superhero Bart Allen in the drama series ''Smallville'' and Reed Garrett ...

Olivia Thirlby Olivia Jo Thirlby (born October 6, 1986) is an American actress. She is best known for her roles as Leah in the comedy-drama film ''Juno'' (2007),Louie, Rebecca (June 28, 2008).Olivia Thirlby is smoking in 'The Wackness'". '' Daily News, location ...

Nick Offerman Nicholas David Offerman (born June 26, 1970) is an American actor, writer, comedian, producer, and carpenter. He is best known for his role as Ron Swanson in the NBC sitcom ''Parks and Recreation'', for which he received the Television Critics A ...

Keegan-Michael Key Keegan-Michael Key (born March 22, 1971) is an American actor, comedian, screenwriter, and producer. He co-created and co-starred alongside Jordan Peele in Comedy Central's sketch series ''Key & Peele'' (2012–2015) and co-starred in USA Netw ...

Brendan Sexton III Brendan Eugene Sexton III (born February 21, 1980) is an American actor. Life and career Born in Staten Island, New York, Sexton made his film debut in Todd Solondz's ''Welcome to the Dollhouse'' playing the troubled bully Brandon McCarthy, for ...

and

Josh Brener Joshua Max Brener is an American actor. He played the roles of Kyle on the IFC series ''Maron'' and Nelson "Big Head" Bighetti on the HBO series ''Silicon Valley''. In animation, he provides the voices of Donatello on ''Rise of the Teenage Mutan ...

. It was released on May 20, 2016, by FilmBuff.

Plot

Woody Ward (Gallner) is a writer of children's books whose rented apartment has a door in the closet that people can go through to undo mistakes they have made in their lives. When his career and romantic life both hit crises, he becomes dissatisfied that he himself cannot go through it.

Cast

as Woody *

as Trudy *

as Moses *

as Proctor *

as Nyles *

as Ripley *

Molly Quinn Molly Caitlyn Quinn is an American actress who has worked in theatre, film, and television. Her roles include Alexis Castle, daughter of the title character on ABC's ''Castle'', and the voice of Bloom, one of the main characters in the Nickelod ...

as Lillian *

Paget Brewster Paget Valerie Brewster (, ; born March 10, 1969) is an American actress and singer. She was first recognized for her recurring role as Kathy on the fourth season of the NBC sitcom ''Friends''. Her breakthrough role came as FBI Supervisory Specia ...

as Priscilla *

Frances Conroy Frances Hardman Conroy is an American actress. She is best known for playing Ruth Fisher on the television series '' Six Feet Under'' (2001–2005), for which she won a Golden Globe and three Screen Actors Guild Awards, and received four Pr ...

as Claiborne *

Bess Rous Bess Rous is an American actress. On television, she was featured as a series regular on the first season of the TNT crime drama '' Murder in the First'' (2014) and the Yahoo! Screen science fiction comedy '' Other Space'' (2015). She also appea ...

as Leah *

A.J. Trauth Andrew James "A. J." Trauth (born September 14, 1986) is an American actor and musician. Trauth is known for playing Alan Twitty on ''Even Stevens'' and Josh Mankey on ''Kim Possible'', both programs which aired on Disney Channel. Acting caree ...

as Penley *Robert Pike Daniel as Osmond * Chauntal Lewis as Farrah *Alexander Wright as Wayfarer

Release

The film premiered at the

Newport Beach Film Festival The Newport Beach Film Festival (NBFF) is an annual film festival in Newport Beach, California, typically held in late April. In 2022, it was announced that the festival have permanently changed its date to be held in October, as the festival beg ...

on April 27, 2015. It was released on May 20, 2016, by FilmBuff. Following the premiere,

Kino Lorber Kino Lorber is an international film distribution company based in New York City. Founded in 1977, it was originally known as Kino International until it was acquired by and merged into Lorber HT Digital in 2009. It specializes in art house films, ...

bought the rights to release it on

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kin ...

Reception

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

the film has an approval rating of 31% based on 16 critics, with an average rating of 4.90/10. On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, ''Welcome to Happiness'' holds an approval rating of 29 out of a 100 based on 6 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews". Matt Fagerholm of '' RogerEbert.com'' gave the film 2 out of 5, while Jared Mobarak of ''The Film Stage'' gave it a "C+".

Neil Genzlinger Neil Genzlinger is an American playwright, editor, book reviewer, and theatre and television critic who frequently writes for ''The New York Times''. Family Genzlinger is a grandson of the late ''The Philadelphia Bulletin'' columnist Don Rose. ...

of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' called '' Welcome to Happiness'' "an airy fantasy of a film" as well as "a little too determined to be eccentric".

References

External links

*{{IMDb title, 3564794 2015 comedy films American comedy films Orion Pictures films 2010s English-language films 2010s American films