Clean, Shaven (1995)

TW: Racism, Ableism / Spoilers Below

After years of being plagued with Hallmark’s wonderbread, puritanical, heterosexual holiday fun, it was refreshing to finally have a Christmas movie that is not about a middle-class (though sometimes royalty if you’re lucky enough to be Vanessa Hudgens or Ben Lamb) straight relationship where they overcome an instant hatred toward one another and have it replaced with “true love” (kind of suspicious if you ask me)? Happiest Season changes both the holiday movie field and the smaller sub-genre of “Christmas canoodling” films by instead centering the story on a lesbian couple, and it employs four openly queer actors (Kirsten Stewart, Dan Levy, Aubrey Plaza, and Victor Garber). The film keeps the representation going off-screen with writer/director/queer icon Clea Duvall at the helm employing Melissa Bretherton as the editor, Amie Doherty composing the cheerful score, and a female-led cast.

The story follows suit with some of the characteristics of the genre: the couple and her family overcome a struggle, are very well-off, and are all white (with the exception of Aubrey Plaza who is white-passing). The main difference within the difficulty to overcome here is that instead of hating each other, Harper has yet to come out to her family when she brings her girlfriend, Abby, home for Christmas (which conversely makes them hate each other later on). Yes, it is exciting to have this amount of representation showcased on and off-screen; but aside from the queer storyline, the misrepresentation of other communities is disappointing and grossly outdated. Surprising as it is, the film thoroughly drops the ball with stereotypes and offensive jokes about a neuro-divergent character, using people of color as plot devices, and uses a “woman of color home-wrecker stereotype” twice (how they had room for that in this overly complex plot, I have no idea). In addition, other POC characters are rendered completely silent/subservient or are given unfulfilling plot lines. So really, how can the story be an emblem for progress when they are putting down other communities and prioritizing whiteness at the center of queerness?