Monday, July 27, 2020

10:00 AM | The Film Meme No. 93

[93rd of 100]. Love is a battlefield, and divorce is a relentless all-or-nothing war -- and when it is undertaken by creative types, the woundings can become creative in their savagery. Welcome to the domestic warzones of Noah Baumbach, one of my favorite directors. In his last film, Marriage Story [2019], he revisits this theme but finds surprising grace notes in his depiction of the unraveling marriage between a theatre director and an actress. Such was not the case in this 2005 film, his fifth as director and the one that proved to be his breakthrough. It is acidic, a story that's basically an extended spiteful spat between two writers going through the mess of separation, and then divorce, as witnessed by their two sons, who react to the turmoil with very specific expressions of rage you can't describe as predictable. The older boy demonizes his mother in favour of his father who really is no better as a parent, borrowing his pretensions in order to cope. [Those pretensions are laughable and also sad.] The younger boy pretends everything is peachy, but releases his frustrations by smearing semen all over school property. The dynamic between their estranged parents is made all the more strained given the husband's writing rut, with only his pedantic posturing in his creative writing classes all that's left of his writerly ego. Meanwhile his wife, who is now dating a younger man, is being published regularly in choice publications like The New Yorker, and reviewed constantly and favourably as well -- which sets her husband off to even more rage. With each of these four left to battle, the film becomes a fascinating symphony of hurt. And by God, the way Baumbach orchestrates all this, it is strangely alluring. Perhaps I can credit that allure, despite the material's darkness, to the intelligence that's brimming from it. Watching smart, writerly types wage war with each other with perfectly worded put-downs is one definite draw. But in the film's wallowing in the bile, I also found a story that is beguiling for its honesty, for its depictions of frailty, for its innate understanding of the dark complexities of human beings. And then there's the allegory of the sea animals in the film's title. When it finally comes out, I teared up: sometimes we remember what we want to remember, or what we think we remember, to bandage our wounds -- but it can also be an illusion, to suit the story we want to believe. It's a tragedy, and one that we can easily fall into. This film is not a warning though; it is a mirror. What's the film?

For the introduction to this meme, read here.

Labels: film

[0] This is Where You Bite the Sandwich

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