''A Happening of Monumental Proportions'' (known as ''A Very Bad Day'' in some countries) is a 2017 American comedy-drama film directed by

Judy Greer Judith Therese Evans (born July 20, 1975), known professionally as Judy Greer, is an American actress. She is primarily known as a character actress, who has appeared in a wide variety of films. She first rose to prominence in a variety of suppor ...

and starring

Allison Janney Allison Brooks Janney (born November 19, 1959) is an American actress. In a career spanning three decades, she is known for her performances across multiple genres of screen and stage. Janney has received various accolades, including an Academ ...

and Common. Produced by

Chris Chris is a short form of various names including Christopher, Christian, Christina, Christine, and Christos. Chris is also used as a name in its own right, however it is not as common. People with the given name *Chris Abani (born 1966), Nige ...

and Paul Weitz, the film is Greer's directorial debut. It was released on September 21, 2018 by Great Point Media.

Plot

Daniel, an account manager ( Common) is having a bad day. Gearing up for Career Day at his daughter's elementary school, the new boss fires him when his affair with his married assistant (

Jennifer Garner Jennifer Anne Garner (born April 17, 1972) is an American actress. Born in Houston, Texas, and raised in Charleston, West Virginia, Garner studied theater at Denison University and began acting as an understudy for the Roundabout Theatre Compa ...

) is revealed. Lonely Darius, Daniel's boss's (

Bradley Whitford Bradley Whitford (born October 10, 1959) is an American actor and producer. He is best known for his portrayal of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Josh Lyman in the NBC television political drama ''The West Wing'' (1999–2006), for which he ...

) son, finds himself instantly entranced by Patricia, Daniel's daughter ( Storm Reid), and seeks advice from their school's shop (

John Cho John Cho (born Cho Yo-Han; June 16, 1972) is an American actor known for his roles as Harold Lee in the '' Harold & Kumar'' films, and Hikaru Sulu in the ''Star Trek'' rebooted film series. Early in his career, Cho also starred in the Asian A ...

) and music teachers (

Anders Holm Anders Christian Holm (born May 29, 1981) is an American actor, comedian, writer, and producer. He is one of the stars and creators of the Comedy Central show ''Workaholics'' and starred in the short-lived NBC series ''Champions''. He, along wit ...

) on how to win her heart. Meanwhile, the principal and vice-principal (

and Rob Riggle) spend the day trying to hide the school's dead gardener from the faculty and staff, as well as the students and their parents. The day culminates at the Career Day activity. Both Daniel and his former boss turn up. They begin to have an altercation that they decide to take outside. At the same time Mr. McRow, and then Darius, wander up on the roof to ponder life. They share feelings about Darius' loneliness and Christian's failure in music. But they connect, while watching the fight between Daniel and Mr. Schneedy. As they are about to go down, Christian falls off the roof and onto the manure pile below, uninjured. In the end, Darius is able to tell his father he's tired of moving, Patricia's dad meets the husband of his former lover, getting closure, and the coroner finally takes away the dead gardener.

Cast

as Principal Nichols * Katie Holmes as Paramedic #1 *

as Nadine, Daniel’s assistant and Bob’s wife *

as Arthur Schneedy, Daniel’s boss *

as Mr. Ramirez, a teacher * Common as Daniel Crawford, Patricia’s father *

as Christian McRow * Storm Reid as Patricia Crawford, Daniel’s daughter * Rob Riggle as Vice Principal Ned Pendlehorn *

Nat Faxon Nathaniel Faxon (born October 11, 1975) is an American actor, comedian, director, and screenwriter. A frequent presence on comedic films and TV series, he won the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for co-writing '' The Descendants'' (2011) ...

as Paramedic #2 *

Kumail Nanjiani Kumail Ali Nanjiani (; ur, کمیل علی ننجیانی, ; born May 2, 1978) is a Pakistani-American actor, comedian and screenwriter. He is known for his role as Dinesh in the HBO comedy series ''Silicon Valley'' (2014–2019) and for co-wr ...

as HR Rep Perry * Keanu Reeves as Bob * Jessica Mikayla Adams as Jamie

Reception

Critical response

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the film has an approval rating of 29% based on 19 reviews, with an average rating of 3.87/10.

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

reports a score of 35/100 based on 9 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".

References

External links

* * American comedy-drama films 2017 directorial debut films 2017 comedy-drama films 2017 comedy films 2010s English-language films 2010s American films {{2010s-comedy-drama-film-stub