Marriage Story

Starring Scarlett Johansson as an actress called Nicole, and Adam Driver as a theatre director called Charlie, Marriage Story was released digitally by Netflix on 6 December, 2019. We see in this critically-acclaimed film that a divorce does not mean that two parties must part ways, loathing each other for the rest of their lives. The respect the couple had for each other can remain, the good qualities in an ex-spouse can still be looked up to, and certain compromises can be gladly made for the good of the children involved.

Directed by Noah Baumbach, the film shows how the dissolution of a marriage can lead two people, who were married for a decade, stop acting civilly with one another. The film also shows how expensive a divorce attorney can be, to the extent that Nicole’s mum takes out a loan against her house to pay her daughter’s lawyer. Unbeknownst to me, a divorce lawyer in the U.S. can charge as high as $950/hour!

We see divorces taking place around us, perhaps more so than ever before, but rarely do we come to know about the emotional distress the husband, wife and their children experience in the process.

It’s not an easy journey, and certainly not an easy choice — the film absorbs you completely, and you begin to associate with the hurt of Nicole when she says that she gave up her budding Hollywood career, and moved to New York City to play roles in the stage shows directed by the man she fell in love with.

In the institution called marriage, she forgot that she was an individual, too, with her own likes and dislikes. In her roles as a wife and a mother, she forgot that she could also dream to become “somebody” away from the shadow of her self-made, successful theatre director husband.

Adam Driver delivered a commendable performance as well. Charlie’s pain, his helplessness against all the accusations, and the effort he undertakes to get the custody of their son — starting from taking long flights from New York City to Los Angeles every week, to renting a home in L.A. so he could spend time with his 8-year-old son, will make you feel for the character. You are bound to empathise with Charlie when he crashes to the kitchen floor from exhaustion.

Nicole and Charlie reach an agreement and finalise the divorce, but at the end of the film, we see that even though living new, successful, and separate lives for a year, Nicole and Charlie still care for and respect each other. In the closing scene, where Charlie carries their sleeping son, Henry, to spend the night with him after trick-or-treating with Nicole’s family and boyfriend on Halloween, Nicole notices his untied shoelace and runs to him to tie it. A simple but powerful gesture of care and thoughtfulness for the person you were once in love with.