An Israeli family gathers together for a dinner party in a mansion in the ritzy part of the Hollywood hills. There is drinking, fighting, infidelity, and a rabbi. For the first half or 2/3 of Happy Times you’d be forgiven for thinking it’s a knockoff Dallas or Falcon Crest. Not a bad film, but not the sort of thing HorrorBuzz is known for. Then there’s a brief segue into Porky’s, and the final act is pretty much a comedy of errors leading to murder after murder, accident after accident.

It’s a fine movie. Fun in parts. Funny, in fact. But there’s a problem.

On IMDb the tagline for Happy Times reads, “A seemingly friendly dinner party erupts into a night of violence and terror at a lush Hollywood estate.” The poster is blood-drenched. The trailer is blood-drenched and scored like The Shining.

In the film itself the most dramatic musical sting accompanies the discovery of an unfortunate dick pic.

This isn’t the Hollywood Chainsaw Massacre (which I would watch!) — this is Four Weddings and a Funeral. This is light comedy. I’m glad I stuck with it, though, because the last act is actually pretty fun. It’s a comedic And Then There Were None without the Agatha Christie mystery. Not quite Clue or Death Becomes Her, but in the same general neighborhood.

It’s a fun movie ruined by misleading advertising. People who would enjoy it might be turned off by the promised gorefest, and people looking forward to that promised gorefest will fall asleep in the first half hour.

It’s what I call the The Fifth Element effect. See, that’s a damned fine comedy science fiction film. One of my favorites of all time, eminently quotable, with amazing, cartoonish characters that are utterly unforgettable. I hated it when I first saw it, though. The advertising killed it. It was presented as a serious, straight hard sci-fi adventure. As such, I thought it was silly and empty. Fortunately for me, though, a friend said, “no, watch it again. It’s a comedy.” What? And it was so. It was a great comedy. But that advertising made me hate it the first time around.

So don’t watch the trailer, don’t read the IMDb page. Listen to me. You can trust me, see? This is a fun light comedy with murder that starts as a parody of wealthporn dramas. It’s worthwhile. Never trust the trailers. They’re not usually made by the filmmakers, and often seem to be made by people who never watched the film.

But I’m generally not here to review the trailers.

When the matriarch cries out, “Nobody kills my husband but me!” or when, after witnessing a death by tchotchke, the young tough asks “What blessing do we say for that, Rabbi?” and–last one–when the young woman exclaims, exasperated, “F*ck all this Middle-Eastern macho Bullsh*t!” it’s honestly funny.

Is it horror? No, it’s a comedy, but watch Happy Times anyway.