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Mingle with Single

At the risk of overselling "How to Be Single," I will say, this film was a nice little silly surprise. I walked in with no real expectations and found myself laughing quite a bit. In the weeks after seeing "Dirty Grandpa" and "Fifty Shades of Black", "How to Be Single" ended up being a pleasant viewing.

Based on the book by Liz Tuccillo, "How to Be Single" follows the been-there trajectory of a woman who is ready to see the world by herself. Alice (Dakota Johnson) has an awkward meet-cute in her dorm hallway with Josh (Nicholas Braun), which is the beginning of a serious relationship. Alice and Josh seem deeply in love and destined to be with one another forever.

As it goes, college ends and it is time for Alice to enter the big, scary real world. She breaks up with Josh because she doesn't know what it's like to see the world through her own eyes. He protests a bit but Alice has made up her mind. She lists all the things that she has never done or accomplished and has adamantly decided she can't do that with a plus-one.

Alice doesn't really have much of a plan on how she is going to conquer Manhattan as a single woman. She moves in with her sister, Meg (Leslie Mann). She begins working as a paralegal, where she meets Robin (Rebel Wilson), a brash free-spirit. Robin latches on to Alice after their first day of working together and refuses to let her go home after work without living Manhattan, Robin-style. An odd-couple friendship blossoms as the two friends party their way through New York City, but at the end of the day Alice knows she has to experience life on her own - not with Josh and not with Robin.  

The entire cast is visibly having a great time. Johnson is effortlessly charming as Alice. There are moments in the film where Johnson gets to flex her muscles as a deadpan comedic performer and she succeeds. It's nice to see what she can do outside of the "Fifty Shades of Grey" world. Wilson flirts with being repetitive with her bawdy one-liners but does score some big laughs throughout.

"How to Be Single" is a little over-stuffed with supporting players but they all work nicely off the leads. Alison Brie shows up as Lucy, who has created an algorithm for deciding the perfect match on a dating site. Brie is always welcomed but you could lift her right out of the movie and nothing would have changed. Ander Holm, Damon Wayans, Jr. and Jake Lacy round out the supporting cast.

Moments of "How to Be Single" certainly don't work. The screenplay - adapted by Abby Kohn, Marc Silverstein and Dana Fox - occasionally relies on contrivances in the name of comedy. In a big city like New York, I find it hard to believe that Alice and Josh would constantly keep running into each other. There is a character revelation tacked on at the end surrounding Wilson's character that does nothing but add a few extra minutes onto the film.

Even so, "How to Be Single" earns a recommendation for numerous laughs and a charming cast that brings this colorful, frothy tale to life. Director Christian Ditter makes Manhattan pop in every frame and "How to Be Single" is as entertaining visually as it is as a comedy.