Film
Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in Chicago, plus articles, trailers and more
- Home
- Box Office
- Listings
- Trailers
- Features
Bookmark this page- Edition:
Happy, Texas (1999)
Director: Mark Illsley
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
Escaped cons Harry (Northam) and Wayne Wayne Wayne Jr (Zahn) hole up in Happy, Texas, after hijacking a camper van - and the locals are expecting them. That is, they're expecting a pair of homosexual beauty pageant directors to coach the town's pre-pubescent girls to the county finals. While the eminently ill-suited Wayne is stuck teaching the teenies to twirl, his much smoother partner sets about be-girlfriending the bank manager, Jo (Walker), and fending off the advances of the sheriff, Chappy Dent (Macy). The film is nothing if not easygoing, and it has its share of neat touches and good lines. Regrettably, most of them occur in the first five minutes. The rest is more slack than slick - which gives you ample time to consider the gaping holes in the plot. Zahn clucks dumb for all he's worth, but director Illsley is unaccountably more interested in Northam's bland, wistful encounters with lovelorn Texans.Author: TCh
Cast & crew
Director: Mark Illsley
Producer: Mark Illsley, Rick Montgomery, Ed Stone
Cast: Jeremy Northam, Steve Zahn, Ally Walker, Illeana Douglas, William H Macy, MC Gainey, Ron Perlman, Paul Dooley full cast
Duration: 99 mins
Features
Gray's anatomy
James Gray wants to push buttons—again.
The next big thing?
Gigantic Releasing tries to rethink indie distribution…without movie theaters.
Red Diva: Lyubov Orlova, First Lady of Soviet Cinema
So you think you can dance, comrade?
Puppet master
Coraline director Henry Selick takes stop-motion animation into 3-D.
Socratic method
Laurent Cantet's approach on the set matches the message of his film.
Wander woman
Kelly Reichardt's Wendy and Lucy puts a Bush-era spin on the road movie.
Oscars
Read our interviews with the nominees, our reviews of the nominated films and more.
What do you think?
Post your review now