The week of Thanksgiving promises turkey, mashed potatoes, awkward reunions, soul-searching and, like clockwork, the annual “turkey dumping” of one unlucky half of couples who ill-advisedly attempted the transition from high school to college. Sweethearts, a new movie from Max (a service that bats higher than the streaming service average when it comes to teen comedies), makes a meal out of this inauspicious Thanksgiving tradition that’s plenty spicy and enough sweet.
Directed by Jordan Weiss, creator of the erstwhile Hulu series Dollface, from a script co-written with Dan Brier, Sweethearts lays out the basic ingredients succinctly, in a clever intro invoking both the naive hope of high school love and the reality of being left on read. Ben (Nico Hiraga) and Jamie (Kiernan Shipka) have been best friends since eighth grade. They have somehow managed to attend the same out-of-state school, and are juggling the usual freshman year identity crisis with long-distance relationships; Ben’s girlfriend Claire (Ava DeMary), an overconfident thespian, is still in high school in Ohio, while Jamie’s boyfriend Simon (Charlie Hall) is playing football for Harvard on a weak GPA.
Though both are seemingly devoted to their high school sweethearts – neither party, to avoid temptation, have made new connections at school – they also view them with believably youthful callousness. While Ben bitingly concedes that, as with someone with an unstable personality, Claire is incredibly good at sex, he is tired of being hounded by her 49 phone calls a day. (Don’t worry: Claire gets the last word.) Jamie is, well, phoning in her phone sex with Simon. After a disastrous night out at an off-campus house party that threads the needle between believable (Ben is forced to play Edward Fortyhands, Jamie loses her clothes) and absurd (you’ll see), the two besties come to the obvious conclusion: it’s time to break up.
Unfortunately, break-ups aren’t just a decision; it’s finding the right circumstances, a horrible waiting period, a tough conversation, then emotional fallout – all things two 18 year-olds (though admittedly no actor here looks like they’re 18) are not equipped to handle well. Break-ups suck, and Ben and Jamie suck at them; their plan to meet their soon-to-be dumpees at their friend Palmer’s (Caleb Hearon) house for his coming out “soiree” (he’s taking a gap year in France) goes awry fast in relatively unpredictable, mostly funny ways.
It’s impressive how much diversion Weiss and Brier pack into a 97-minute movie that does eventually get to the disastrous dumping. Palmer’s hi-jinks filled route to readjusting his expectations on coming out, what he wants from his post-high school life, and that, yes, there are gay people in rural Ohio is far more nuanced and substantial than the usual B-plot, sweet but not cloying, largely thanks to impeccable comedic timing by the helplessly endearing Hearon.
The longtime stand-up comedian anchors several strong supporting performances, including comedian Sophie Zucker as the source of Jamie’s allergy to close female friendships, Tramell Tillman and Joel Kim Booster as Palmer’s coming-out guides, and Christine Taylor as Ben’s over-enthusiastic mom – who, of course, watches When Harry Met Sally on a sleepy Thanksgiving afternoon.
The question of whether men and women can just be friends is often an annoying one, but it’s cannily (and knowingly) deployed here. Ben and Jamie have a sharp if occasionally forced chemistry – Shipka, who grew up on screen as Mad Men’s Sally Draper, finally seems to be working through some longtime on-screen stiffness, as a brittle, guarded character who isn’t afraid to alienate people. Hiraga, a skater turned actor, excels at playing the lovable, physically affectionate good-guy stoner; his one speed gets a little extra velocity here when forced, by plot, to hurt someone’s feelings. Together, the two make for a compelling on-screen pair, though their tartness isn’t the flavor of lovers.
I have small quibbles with the movie – mostly that it is very green outside for supposedly late-November Ohio – but this is not one of them. The way Sweethearts floats the possibility of sex among two friends close enough to talk about it often, close enough that other people assume they already are, threatens to take the film into eye-roll territory. But Weiss and Brier are smarter than that, and Sweethearts thankfully avoids full predictability – a welcome relief, particularly in a film that embraces the rampant horniness of 18-year-olds. Even if you’ve suffered through the turkey dump, this one is a treat.
Sweethearts is available on Max on 28 November in the US with a UK date to be announced
