How to be Single: Movie Review

As anyone who knows me could tell you, I love a lot of movies and most of them are pretty terrible. One of those movies is How to Be Single, a movie that I love and cherish while many critics called it “annoying” and “a movie version of a Buzzfeed quiz.” Still, though, how many movies are there with similar plotlines as How to Be Single and centered around single men are there? And how many of those are considered annoying, and don’t have their posters perpetually nailed to every frat boys walls (I’m looking at you, Hangover)? I’d wager to guess that list is much shorter than movies centered around single women, or just women in general.

How to Be Single is not a film that is going to make you question your mortality or whether we’re alone in the universe, but it is going to remind you that it’s okay to not be okay all the time and to make as many mistakes as you possibly can. Often times women and especially women of color are not given the same number of chances to make mistakes as men. An example that stands out for me is from the trailer for the film On the Basis of Sex, coming out Christmas Day, where they ask then Harvard Law student Ruth Bader Ginsburg to explain why she took a place that could have gone to a man. They expect her to feel lucky not that she has successfully passed through one of the most rigorous applications of any college in America, but because she successfully took something that was not rightfully hers. Women should be allowed to succeed, but they should also be allowed to fail. If you ignore the sex scene set to the Lil Jon banger “Turn Down for What,” How To Be Single is masterful in this pursuit and effectively gives women a roadmap on how to fail and how to get back up and do it all over again.

At the start of the film, protagonist Alice, played by Dakota Johnson (who also starred in the Fifty Shades trilogy which I demand everyone watch immediately), tells her boyfriend of four years that she needs to take a break to find herself. Rather than pull an Eat, Pray, Love and fly to India, though, she moves to New York City alone which is where she meets Robin, played by Rebel Wilson. Robin is not the kind of woman who apologizes, making her just the woman Alice needs in her life and she gives Alice the permission she needed to live however she wants to and constantly make mistakes. Often times as women and as women in college we evaluate situations and opportunities by all of the negative things that could come of them, ignoring all of the possibilities for success. As someone with anxiety, I am guilty of this constantly. I have seen internships and jobs that sound like my dream job, but I never go for them for fear of embarrassing myself or not succeeding. Really though, these should be the exact kinds of opportunities I should be chasing. Learning how to fail is important because it teaches you the skills you need to succeed. The love of your life shouldn't be some guy in your class who has cool hair and thinks saying “girls are, like, smart” is feminism or, in my case, Harry Styles; it should be yourself. So don't be afraid to take a difficult class, don't be afraid to realize that your major isn't actually what you want any more, don't be afraid to do things alone, don't be afraid to embrace yourself.