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How to Be Single | 2016 | R | - 7.3.6

Four women (Dakota Johnson, Rebel Wilson, Alison Brie and Leslie Mann) and several men navigate the confusing pathways of friendship, drinking, sex and love in New York City. Also with Anders Holm, Jake Lacey, Nicholas Braun, Jason Mantzoukas and Damon Wayans, Jr. Directed by Christian Ditter. [1:50]

SEX/NUDITY 7 - Several women hold lollipops in the shape of penises with testicles and one woman sucks her lollipop suggestively in close-up and a man walks up and kisses the woman in front of the group of women, who look surprised.
 A woman in an apartment window wears a crop top (revealing slight cleavage) and short shorts as she phones a man across the alley who is wearing only briefs and exhibiting an evident erection (covered by his underwear) as she asks, "You need help with that?" and he falls backwards onto his bed and the scene ends. A man and a woman kiss passionately and fall onto a couch (sex is implied as the scene ends); we see the couple in the morning and they are shown lying under covers as he tells her that he does not want relationships with women and does things to make them leave him. A pregnant woman says that her hormones have changed and that she needs 10 minutes of sex with a man; she meets a man at a party, goes to his apartment, he kisses her, stands between her legs as she sits on a counter, and sex is implied as the scene ends.
 A fully clothed woman wakes in an apartment and finds a man in the kitchen wearing shorts only (his bare chest is visible and it is implied that they had sex). A clothed woman sees a man standing in the bedroom doorway while wearing only tight-fitting briefs (sex between the two is implied). A man kisses a woman passionately at a rooftop party and they enter a bedroom, where he unbuttons her blouse and his shirt (we see some of her cleavage and a strip of his bare chest) until he says he is still engaged and she pulls away; he says sex with her will be closure for him and she leaves the party to go home alone. A woman flashes a man with her open blouse in a bar to reveal her bra covered with sequins and we see moderate cleavage.
 Several dance club scenes show women wearing short skirts while a few women in these scenes wear low-cut blouses and dresses that reveal moderate-to-significant cleavage; one woman in each scene wears V-necked dresses that reveal ample cleavage and in three of these scenes a man and a woman kiss briefly, hugging while they dance. Several street scenes and three home scenes show women wearing short dresses and short shorts that reveal bare legs to the top of the thigh. At the office Christmas party, a woman takes items out of her large cleavage to give as presents. A woman wearing a mini skirt reads a story to young children in a bookstore; she bends forward and reveals cleavage, then lifts her skirt, pulls at her tight pantyhose and uses scissors to cut it off as the bookstore manager clears the children out of the room and tells her to stop. In a co-ed dorm hallway, several women appear wearing towel wraps to the knee, revealing slight cleavage and a man is shown fully nude from the back. Two women wearing long towel wraps sit in a sauna as one woman looks up the other woman's towel and says that her pubic hair looks like she had a long term relationship and looks like petrified curly fries.
 A man kisses a woman for several seconds while standing near a large outdoor Christmas tree. A man kisses a woman goodbye on the cheek.
 A single woman decides to have a baby and employs a sperm donor; when her second pregnancy test shows "positive" a female friend says, "We'll take care of it" but the pregnant woman says that she is happy. A man breaks up with a woman at a train station during Christmas, saying that he has sex from one holiday to the next with any woman he dates and then breaks up with her; the woman looks stunned. In a hospital when a baby is born, a man proposes to the woman having the baby and she accepts. A woman becomes very angry during a reading in a bookstore and says that princes always use princesses and then leave them, startling the children in her audience. A man tells a woman that he wants to have sex just for fun and not for a relationship; he has her watch as he tells a female friend this in a bar and the friend kisses him on the cheek and leaves. A woman tells a new woman at work to sleep at different men's homes every night and get them to pay for food and alcoholic drinks. A man tells a woman that she is awesome and they begin dating, then they become engaged. A woman tells another woman at work, "Do not hook up in the copy room. There is surveillance." A woman tells a coworker to let men buy her drinks as payment for sex without resorting to prostitution. A man says that sex is the best way to find out what one wants in a woman long term. A woman tells a female friend, "Put your tongue in that bartender's face" (she does not). A woman pretends to be a lesbian and tells a female friend that she is in love with her, and then laughs loudly. A woman at a party avoids three men with whom she has had sex and finally says goodbye to all three. A man and a woman live together and when they break up he says, "I miss your boobs." A man meets a woman in a café and tells her that he is seeing someone else and later says that he is engaged. A woman tells a female coworker that 27 drinks consumed by her and any man necessitates having sex and she needs 24 drinks in order to touch herself sexually. We hear that a nude woman slid down the trash chute of an apartment building.

VIOLENCE/GORE 3 - A woman awakens in a strange apartment, finds a man in the kitchen and raises a carving knife to him, but drops it when he tells her it is his apartment. A woman punches a female coworker in the chest at work and the second women yelps in pain.
 A woman shines a cell phone light between a pregnant woman's legs and says the baby is crowning (we see only the woman's lower legs); when the cab arrives at the hospital, the door won't open and the non-pregnant woman slides out the window and pulls the pregnant woman out of it (the woman in labor grunts in pain) and the camera cuts to the woman and her sister lying on a hospital bed, looking at a newborn. A woman throws herself onto the hoods of two slow-moving cabs in order to get a pregnant woman a ride to the hospital.
 A woman covered with a sheet in labor in a delivery room sweats and shouts in pain and then asks, "What if I poop?"; she later asks, "Is that poop or a baby?" and the doctor says, "It isn't a baby" (we do not see what it is). A pregnant woman with a swollen belly stands on a sidewalk and her water breaks (we see liquid pouring onto the sidewalk). We see a woman spit hot chocolate back into the cup and a man spit hot chocolate in a spray into a street. A woman spits a spray of coffee onto a sidewalk.
 A man and woman argue (he shouts very loudly) about his dead wife and he breaks up with her. A man tells a second man to stay away from his fiancée, saying, "I will straight up end you!" A man and a woman argue mildly in a few scenes and in one scene, she cries and hugs him. A man and a pregnant woman argue several times; she throws a baby chair at him in a store, but misses, breaking a few other items in the store and he later tells her that she cannot control everything all the time and walks away. A man plays video of his dead wife and cries briefly.

LANGUAGE 6 - About 12 F-words and its derivatives, 1 obscene hand gesture, 22 sexual references, 19 scatological terms, 11 anatomical terms, 7 mild obscenities, name-calling (crazy, stupid, weird, nuts, idiot, psycho, buzz kill, sidekick, monster, taint, ugly losers, workaholic, old, piece of work, codependent, needy, MacGyver), exclamations (shut-up), 34 religious exclamations (e.g. Oh My God, Holy [scatological term deleted], My God, Thank God).

SUBSTANCE USE - A woman tells another woman to take two Tylenol, a woman says that the good thing about doctors is that they have access to pills, a woman says that she is hung over and drinks a large bottle of Pedialyte, a woman takes a home drug test and declares that she is on drugs, and a doctor says that no one ever asked for a prescription for Medical Marijuana. Half a dozen scenes occur in a neighborhood bar where couples drink beer or gin and tonics and people in the background drink from tall glasses of unknown beverages and glasses of wine, a woman drinks a shot of clear liquor, a woman shouts, "Happy Alcoholic's Day!" on St. Patrick's day, we see a tower of green beer cups overflowing with beer in close-up, a man texts a woman to ask if she wants to get drunk (no reply), many men and women drink large amounts of alcohol in club scenes and a party scene and one man drinks from a fifth-sized bottle of light-colored liquor while others drink bottles of beer with many empties on tables as well as multiple shots and tall cocktails along with short glasses of whiskey and very large glasses of wine and small glasses of champagne, a man and a woman at an apartment drink from beer bottles and count nine empties already consumed between them, men and women at a business gathering drink from glasses of wine and cocktails, we see two bottles of beer in a refrigerator as well as several bottles of beer in another refrigerator and several bottles of beer in a combination nightstand-refrigerator, a man and a woman have Mimosas (we do not see them drink), a man and a woman hold a baby and he holds a glass of wine or light beer, two women have Cosmopolitans (we do not see them drink), a woman says one morning that she may be a little drunk, a woman tells a new woman at work that people have a drink number (the number of drinks consumed between them that necessitates sex) and says that her drink number is 27 (please see the Sex/Nudity category for more details), a woman visits a hair salon where she drinks champagne, a woman pops open a champagne bottle (she does not drink), a woman chugs from a bottle of cooking wine in a culinary class, and a woman says that she sterilized her mouth and hands with vodka (we do not see this).

DISCUSSION TOPICS - Dating, sex, love, jealousy, drinking, relationships, marriage, divorce, parenting, death, friendship, love, respect, honesty.

MESSAGE - Everyone needs to know who they are when they are alone.

CAVEATS

Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.

We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.

Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.


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