Noah Baumbach’s “Marriage Story” - An Engaging, Brilliantly Acted Film, with Gaping Holes
by SaraKay Smullens, MSW, LCSW, DCSW, CGP, CFLE, BCD
Have you ever experienced a brilliantly performed, highly lauded film, one that held many moments of captivating, authentic writing genius, and yet you knew there were serious omissions and because of this, the work was sadly – even dangerously – misleading? Such was my experience with Noah Baumbach’s newest film, Marriage Story, a likely Oscar contender, with a blockbuster cast including Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson, Laura Dern, and Alan Alda.
The film’s title implies examination, in this case of the downfall of a marriage – where two who once loved deeply, lost the relationship that had been precious to each, replacing love with festering rage. Disappointingly, however, rather than explanation of the reasons for divorce, we are offered what amounts to literary pablum - superficial, cliché driven examples of control and creative expression frustration that are symptoms, not root causes. The intense scene where roots of marital downfall are exposed is glossed over, then completely ignored.
As social workers and those in related fields know, each of us who marry comes to marriage with varying degrees of what writer Maggie Scarf aptly describes as “unfinished business,” rooted in our past. Major life events, such as marriage, childbirth, and death of parents bring unresolved, unidentified, not understood emotional business closer to the surface. These blind spots impede an ability to be compassionate and sensitive to a partner’s attempts to communicate love, loyalty, need, desire, and frustration. Mutually fulfilling marriage requires determination, hard work, grit: as we grow and change, it is necessary to refine the art of hearing our partner (even when angry), negotiation and compromise, augmented with a vital, robust sense of humor; but unfinished emotional business impedes this success, causing us to repeat the same patterns of relationship failure, without understanding why.
As the story of Nicole and Charlie’s marriage is framed, I will avoid plot intricacies or how they are resolved.
Charlie (Driver – isn’t it great that freckles and moles, nature’s portrait, are finally celebrated!) is a young, driven, brilliant NYC theatre director married to Nicole (Johansson), a former L.A.-based, recognized talent (from a theatrical family), who uproots her life when she falls passionately in love with Charlie. Nicole relocates to NYC to support her love’s work and talent, bowing to his direction and helping him establish his prominence, his star eventually eclipsing hers. Charlie’s self-absorption renders him oblivious to his wife’s longings and frustrations, overpowering her attempts to communicate her growing helplessness and despair.
Despite this backdrop, the film depicts Charlie and Nicole as decent, innately kind people, and their initial and remaining affection and concern for each other is clear, as is their mutual devotion to their son, Henry (Azhy Robertson). Their sexual attraction, still flickering, has been paralyzed by the weight of unrecognized, buried issues. Blind to the reasons for his wife’s misery (more and more, she is a mother figure to both husband and son), Charlie is clueless that Nicole’s return to L.A. with Charlie (which he views as short term) has a purpose beyond professional expression – divorce and custody of their child. Few facing divorce have an extended family like the one awaiting Nicole in L.A. - supportive, generous, financially secure, imperfectly perfect (and adorable). You will yearn to transplant her mom, played by Julie Hagerty, and sister, played by Merritt Wever, into your world.
The heart-wrenching, hate-filled scene alluded to earlier provides the opportunity to expose the source of the couple’s malignant marital infection. Instead, it is presented as evidence that the marriage is over – far, far from truth. This raw moment, where vicious anger is directed at a partner, is a missed opportunity. Examination could well have brought a still devoted couple (or any couple experiencing this kind of pain and rageful despair) far deeper understanding and intimacy. Essential, illuminating questions screamed to be addressed: Why did Nicole allow years of domination? Did her choice involve loss of a father? Why was Charlie demandingly, devouringly controlling? What was he really hungry for? Who (or what) was the expressed hatred actually directed toward? Without resolve, one carries this seething, unrecognized inner core, infecting new relationships.
As I watched the film, my mind raced to the clients (male and female) who, years following their divorces, experience deep regret that their decisions and their impact were not well thought out and only superficially understood. And I think of adult sons and daughters of both divorce and unhappy marriages, confused about what marriage and commitment actually mean, yearning for a path to fulfillment.
Of course, divorce is often necessary for the future well-being of partner and children, and perhaps the divorce of Charlie and Nicole belongs in this category. The importance of understanding one’s personal contribution to a lost marriage helps one to let go and move forward, avoiding past attraction leading to repeated relationship failure and behavioral mistakes in the future.
The most reliable in-depth insight of Marriage Story is the light it shines on how the adversarial divorce process increases a couple’s anger and attacks their abilities to reason. Nicole’s scheming divorce lawyer (Dern) offers brilliant feminist expression of all that women can lose in marriage and a misogynist society. Charlie’s attorney (Ray Liotta) seems like the criminal (now with grey hair) who stepped off of the set of the 1990s Martin Scorsese film, Goodfellas. He replaces nice guy Alda, whom Dern would devour pre-breakfast.
It would be unwise, even dangerous, for mere mortals (like our clients and ourselves) to believe what Baumbach provides on screen is a deep, authentic “marriage story.” Noah Baumbach’s film is engrossing, charming, delicious to watch, with brilliant acting. Yet, the emotional map it offers is unrealistic and skimpy. Its gaping holes bring the viewer a film offering diversion and distorted, skewed honesty. With approximately 50% of couples experiencing divorce, including our clients and ourselves, Marriage Story could have provided so much more.
SaraKay Smullens, MSW, LCSW, DCSW, CGP, CFLE, BCD, whose private and pro bono clinical social work practice is in Philadelphia, is a certified group psychotherapist and family life educator. She is a recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award (2004) and the Social Worker of the Year (2018) from the Pennsylvania chapter of NASW, and the 2013 NASW Media Award for Best Article. In 2018, she was one of five graduates of the University of Pennsylvania School of Social Policy and Practice selected for the school's inaugural Hall of Fame. SaraKay is the author of Whoever Said Life Is Fair, Setting YourSelf Free, and Burnout and Self-Care in Social Work. Her writing has been published in peer-reviewed journals, newspapers, and blogs. SaraKay's professional life continues to be devoted to highlighting destructive societal forces through communication, advocacy and activism. Read more about her work at SaraKaySmullens.com.
The author’s professional papers documenting how vulnerable women and children are violated by emotional, physical, and sexual abuse, and why all matters of custody and divorce belong outside of an adversarial arena, are in a Special Library Collection at Baltimore’s Goucher College, accessible for purposes of education, research, and scholarship. For further information, contact Tara Olivero, Director of Special Collections: tara.olivero@goucher.edu.