Writer-Director Noah Baumbach’s latest movie, Marriage
Story, is a sweet, devastating, compassionate, rewarding and beautiful
film. The title may seem a bit
misleading, as the film dramatically depicts a couple’s path through an often painful,
increasingly adversarial divorce. But as
Baumbach explained to me following a screening at the Mill Valley Film Festival
earlier this autumn, his aim was to use the divorce as a frame from which the
story of their marriage emerges. It’s a
unique and remarkably effective perspective. Bottom line: it works!
This is not to say that the divorce is in any way a minor
aspect of the story. Au contraire. The parties’ separation inevitably forces major
life changes for Charlie (Adam Driver) and Nicole (Scarlett Johansson) and provides
the drama that propels the narrative and the inspiration for their respective reflections
on what’s been lost. Along the way, we get a birds-eye view of how the law and our
adversarial, competitive legal system often plays on the confusion and fears of
good people going through scary changes, exacerbating conflicts rather than focusing
on dialogue and resolution.
But ultimately, Marriage Story delivers a very
human, positive message. Trevor Noah, interviewing Noah Baumbach on the Daily
Show a few days ago, nailed an important aspect of the film. “It’s a story that
does not dismiss the idea of love, even in a divorce.” The end of a marriage
does not mean that love has ceased to exist. As this movie credibly suggests, “Their
love was real; their story just ended. But the love carries on in a different
way. It’s beautiful.”
Before I became an ace movie reviewer, I spent most of my
professional career as a divorce lawyer and mediator; so when I say that this
is an honest and deeply truthful movie, you can bet that I know what I’m
talking about. Baumbach too knows
something about the divorce process. His first marriage ended in divorce. More
significantly, it seems to me, his parents’ divorce when he was a teenager had
a profound effect on Baumbach – something which we can see and feel in his
second major feature film, The Squid and the Whale (2005), a semi-autobiographical
story about two kids, a teen (Jesse
Eisenberg) and his 12-year-old brother, suffering through the separation and increasingly
antagonistic relationship of their parents - played by Jeff Daniels and Laura
Linney. That story, focused primarily on custody issues, is seen largely from
the kids’ perspective.
The Squid and the Whale is one of the most accurate,
insightful, poignant motion pictures I have ever seen about the effects of a
marital breakup on parents and children; one that I frequently recommended to
clients on the brink of adversarial custody disputes. Marriage Story may be even
better. Its focus is more on the adults than on Nicole’s and Charlie’s darling child,
Henry. But it is no less arresting. The actors are superb, the situations
realistic, the screenplay sharp, intelligent, darkly witty, and keenly affecting.
Plus, it features some great evocative music, from the likes of Eric Clapton,
Ed Sheeran, Tara George, The Calling (Wherever You Will Go), The Police,
and the great Otis Redding (I’ve Been Loving You Too Long) and the
Righteous Brothers (Unchained Melody). Oh my!
Here’s the story in a nutshell. Charlie is the director of a
small theater company in New York City and an acclaimed director of off-Broadway
plays. His wife Nicole is a well-regarded lead actress in the company. They have a young son, Henry [Ashy Robertson -
Juliet, Naked (2018)], about 7 or 8-years-old. Charlie is a New Yorker through and through
and thinks the world revolves around that city; he further believes that the apex
of theatrical art is the stage drama and New York is the center of that universe.
Nicole is from L.A. where her mother and sister still live. While she has
enjoyed success as Charlie’s leading lady, she has always wanted to return to
her hometown to work in what she sees as the big time: television or the movies.
Charlie has given lip service to someday moving to California, but Nicole
realizes that with his worldview and his ego, he will never seriously consider
the idea; so she feels unheard and stifled in their relationship. As the movie
opens, Nicole has told Charlie she has an opportunity to audition for a lead
role in a new TV series and she’s going to L.A. for that, with Henry. As the film opens, the two are at impasse, so Charlie
and Nicole are seeing a mediator. 
Some critics have compared Marriage Story to
another excellent divorce film, 1979’s Kramer vs Kramer, winner of five
Academy Awards including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor for star Dustin
Hoffman and Best Supporting Actress for co-star Meryl Streep. Having not seen
that classic since it came out forty years ago, I re-watched it last night to
see if the comparison holds. In many ways it does. Both movies are about two
good people who get caught up in the whirlwind of divorce law and lawyer tactics
– partly out of concern for their young son and mostly due to somewhat selfish
fears for their respective parental rights. Both movies are quite dramatic and
emotive in depicting the hard, anguished choices that have to be made, while indicting
the legal system for aggravating rather than ameliorating the situation. And
both feature terrific acting, especially by the leads.
Kramer vs Kramer is also interesting now in the way
it reflects its own time, the late 1970s, in which a woman’s right to live her
life as a co-equal to rather than an appendage of her husband (or without a
husband) was just beginning to gain public acceptance. An Unmarried Woman
(1978) about a woman struggling to forge an independent identity after her
husband left her (famously claiming that he was just “going through a selfish
phase”) had been released the previous year, garnering three Oscar nominations.
Scenes From A Marriage (1974), Ingmar Bergman’s realistic, psychologically
astute examination of the changing power relationship between a woman and her
husband (Liv Ullmann and Erland Josephson), was revelatory at the time and won
numerous awards, among them Best Foreign Language Film at the Golden Globes.
But viewed with contemporary eyes, I have to say that Marriage
Story is better than Kramer vs Kramer. Most surprisingly, in a
way, Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson in Marriage Story are at
least as good as Hoffman and Streep in Kramer vs. Kramer and probably
better. I’ve seen Driver in a number of things, from the TV series Girls in
2012 to Francis Ha (2012), Inside Llewyn Davis (2013), Star
Wars VII and VIII (2015, 2017), Patterson (2016), Logan
Lucky (2017) and BlacKkKlansman (2018), but I’ve never seen him open
up and show the range of emotion and vulnerability, from chutzpah to despair,
that he does in this movie. Johansson has a larger portfolio, and while I haven’t
seen all of her work, I’ve seen a representative sample, from Ghost World in 2001, to Lost in Translation
and Girl with a Pearl Earring (both 2003), Match Point (2005), Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008), Under
the Skin (2013), her terrific voice work in Her (2013), and a couple of her
Marvel movies. I’ve also just seen Johansson’s lovely turn as the mother in her
other current film, Jo Jo Rabbit. Her Nicole is a fuller, richer, more
completely realized character than any other I’ve seen her play – a revelation
really. Someone said she seems to be turning into Annette Bening, and I can’t
disagree. 
Another good thing is how Baumbach doesn’t play favorites. Unlike
Kramer, which was primarily about Hoffman’s character, Marriage
Story gives equal time and attention to each of its two protagonists,
Charlie and Nicole. I, at least, found
my sympathies switching back and forth between them over the course of the
movie. Neither is perfect, there are flaws in each of their arguments and
attitudes. At the same time, both are interesting, talented well-intended
people.
Jane Alexander was a standout supporting player in Kramer
vs Kramer but after her, the rest of the ensemble, although fine, was
nothing to write home about. Marriage Story features a number of
excellent supporting performances. Probably chief among these is Laura Dern as
Nicole’s high-powered feminist lawyer, Nora Fenshaw. She’s the center of every
scene she’s in, from advising and encouraging Nicole during their consultations
to bringing larger than life advocacy to the courtroom. And Dern has a spirited,
funny, showstopping soliloquy near the end of the second act that would make Al
Pacino proud, (if Pacino was a feminist attorney). To counter Nora Fenshaw, Charlie hires her
counterpart, Jay, a powerhouse male attorney played by Ray Liotta. Both of
these counselors see divorce as a gladiatorial contest, demonizing the “other
side” as an unscrupulous, greedy, lying adversary. Liotta gets off some pretty
good lines too. Encouraging Charlie to take a hard line, he says in a somewhat
assertive growly speech, “If we start off from a place of reasonable and
they start off from a place of crazy; when we settle, we’ll be somewhere
between reasonable and crazy!”
Both Nicole and Charlie start off hoping that the lawyers
will help them work things out, but Nicole, feeling weak and uncertain, opts for
the tough as nails advocate to protect her. Charlie eschews that approach at
first, consulting a less expensive, milder counselor called Bert
Spitz (Alan Alda), who urges him to avoid conflict as much as possible and make
compromises. Spitz is somewhat of a mensch and Alda plays the part perfectly. Although,
Spitz gives Charlie sound advice, Charlie just can’t swallow some of it,
believes he may be getting screwed and switches over to the gladiator, Jay.
Another highlight is Julie Haggerty, as Nicole’s warmhearted
but ditzy mother, Sandra. She’s mostly comic relief, and she nails it. Likewise,
Merritt Wever as Nicole’s similarly ditzy but loving sister, Cassie, does a
lovely job and lightens up every scene she’s in.
I suspect that Marriage Story will be a big
factor in the awards race come January-February. I see it as a contender for
Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress (Dern), Best Director
and Best Screenplay. If you’re a fan of great acting, this one is for you. It’s
also an intelligent, funny-sad, completely engaging, ultimately heartwarming drama
- well worth its slightly over two-hour run-time. Produced by Netflix, it will begin streaming there
on December 6th. In the meantime, it is showing in select theaters. Why wait?
It’s pretty great, and everything looks better on the big screen!
2 hours 16 minutes Rated
R “for language throughout and sexual
references”
references”
Grade: A
In select theaters nationwide. Streaming on Netflix
beginning December 6, 2019.
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