Marriage Story: A Personal Reflection
Thursday, January 2, 2020 at 10:19AM 
This awards season has been a curious one. Thanks to Netflix, a handful of heavy contenders were made widely available when, in other years, you'd expect them to be stuck in limited release until late January. Oscar obsessives and film enthusiasts around the world were able to enter a conversation that's usually exclusive to critics and cinephiles from New York and LA. This democratization of film discussion is wonderful, but along with it came some of the internet's worst impulses. I'm talking about memes.
Specifically, I'm talking about the meme-ification of Marriage Story's climactic fight, a moment that made me relieve some of the worst parts of my life…
The scene comes late in Noah Baumbach's semi-autobiographical drama after many other small skirmishes have been fought in the war of broken matrimony. Still, nothing like this has come to pass. You can feel the tension growing throughout the previous arguments, but, earlier, both partners hold back. They didn't point out hypocrisies when they could and reserved tears for solitude. Now, they don't hold back, both going for blood and saying things they shouldn't. Worse, they can't stop themselves. To love someone is to give them the weapon of your destruction and hope against hope that they'll never use it. They use it.
Charlie and Nicole fire ammo made out of intimate insecurities and open a Pandora's box that can never be closed. These things can't be unsaid and there's horror in their eyes when they realize the mutual violation. In particular, when Charlie speaks of wishing Nicole's death, a line is crossed; it's as if they're both paralyzed with shock. He cries, she tears up and ends up consoling the man who just wished her dead. In the miasma of love and hate in which they live, such contradicting gestures live in logical harmony. However, if watched in isolation, it may ring false and read like overacting.
These scenes are not meant to be consumed as short clips. The former couple screams and a wall is punched but, in context, it works as an exhausted coda to a symphony in constant crescendo. Even discounting the rest of the narrative, the fight scene starts with rigid postures and uneasy smiles, with condescending expressions instead of shouting matches. It's fascinating to see how the difference in each characters' limits through the fine modulation of the two performances. Their escalation of hurt feelings is walked at different paces and only at the end do they coexist in the same place of bruised hearts and despair.
Such a careful dance of emotional warmongering is difficult to do without maudlin hysterics getting in the way. It's a testament to Baumbach, Johansson and Driver's virtuosity that such fate is avoided. This fight is real and lived in.
While I've never been married, I've been in a long-term relationship that fell apart and involved many conflicts similar to those in Marriage Story. To watch the film a few weeks after the end of that love affair was like being hit in the chest with echoes of past traumas and anxieties. I've cried each of the five times I've watched the film and it doesn't get less hurtful with repeat viewings. The details strike a chord, like the dismissal of Nicole's feelings, the insincerity, the disrespect when moving through the house, the cursing, up to the the infantile begging for comfort at the finale. The way old resentments explode like a bomb full of nails is genuine. I feel a whiff of invalidation every time someone makes fun of the fight scene as if it's a bad melodrama, a ridiculous thing that doesn't happen in life. But anyone in a failed relationship will know that it does.
Do you see uncomfortable reflections of past relationships in Marriage Story?
Reader Comments (29)
Marriage Story looked to me as Baumbach bitching about his divorce for two hours, misgoynistic to exhaustation and childish most of the time. He couldn't even avoid his supporting characters to label his alter ego as a genius, repeatedly. I only saved Julie Hagerty from the disaster, while I concede that the actors are all great at doing what they were told to do, but again, Hagerty aside, I did not see anything Award calibre in any competitive year. I thought Driver was better in The Report and I almost would consider Johansson more seriously for Avengers Endgame than for this caricature with continuous frown.
That’s actually the scene that ruined the movie for me. I found the writing and directing all wrong, and the strength of the acting couldn’t save the scene from feeling preposterous. Several rewatches haven’t changed my initial reaction.
Agree wholeheartedly with this article Claudio. I couldn't believe how raw and real that acting felt but out of context it does read as histrionic. But reading wrong out of context does not make you any less genius. It just reminds us that people need to value context. Movies are not 2 minutes long. Context is essential.
This scene broke my heart, specially Nicole's tears when she realises the man she loved (loves) wishes her death - she's hurt because of his words but she's also hurt because she understands how that legal battle has led them to that point. In this scene they're both monsters and victims, but the true Pandora box belongs to Charlie.
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And I just I've to mention how sweet it is having her calling him "honey" in the very beginning in spite of being separated
I have avoided watching the scene on its own and I'm glad I have, because I thought it was pitch perfect in the movie. I've been in the room when arguments explode into melodrama - it really happens.
Context is essential.
Had the movie not been autobiographical, I would have been able to sit with it and admire it today, weeks after having seen it. But unfortunately, given the context, I feel less and less inclined to hold onto the things I truly admired about this movie and more taken by the fact that he's a narcissist with no regard for exposing his ex-wife in a negative light and how this movie will always live to haunt Jennifer Jason Leigh in different ways throughout her life, no matter what she says about it now and how generous and complicit she might be in real life.
This film is a devastating experience. There are moments that will make you turn away from the screen in horror. But it is true and honest and lovely. I have not been a fan of Baumbach, but this is a masterpiece.
I though this scene whilst impressively written rang a bit set piecey,Scarlett doesn't know what do in a two or wide shot,her frustrated body language that thing actors do shake there arms and jump slightly say 0 about the characters feelings.
What I though was worse was the basic obviousness of the Dern character and her obvious speechifying,a character that only seems logical on the page,it was like a big bad lawyer vs men sketch.
Where is Alda's praise and nominations.
Jared -- i think people should not be so hung up on reading Jennifer Jason Leigh into everything. I feel 1000% certain that this is autofiction... like Almodovar says about PAIN & GLORY. Yes, it's based on real life but it's also heavily fictionalized. And Baumbach has said that other couples inspired parts of the movie.
I had to pause this scene three separate times while watching it for the first time because I was crying so hard. I felt this scene like a brick to the chest. It is 100% authentic. Having been married for 15 years now, and having gone through a separation that mirrored a lot of what these two go through, I've been there. When Charlie wishes Nicole dead...I felt that...because you know he doesn't mean it, but in ways he does, and when you've been in that kind of a relationship you wholly understand why.
Great piece.
Also, if you come away from this film thinking Charlie looks like a saint, or even a "genius," I don't know what to tell you other than you're probably watching it with some serious preconceived notions.
Speaking of character's supposedly based on Jennifer Jason Leigh, does anybody remember that film she co-wrote and directed, The Anniversary Party?
In that film she plays an actress married to a writer and throughout the film everyone is going on and on about how the character in his new screenplay is a thinly-veiled version of her, and it's SO obvious and everyone automatically assumes she's playing the role. Then at the climax her husband can't take it anymore and he blows up explaining that the role is an amalgamation of women he's known throughout his entire life including his mother.
That scene feels particularly relevant at the moment.
Great post, Claudio.
Yes, Michael C. It's very prophetic, even thought that movie was released in 2001.
In a way or another, everything is autofiction. How can one dissociate themselves completely or not use their personal experiences when writing something, even if subliminally or unconsciously? I wish I could look at Baumbach and feel honesty in his intentions.
Wow. Thanks for the write up. The weekend when Marriage Story came out I had a communication exchange with a long-term relationship that descended into failure and anger as it progressed. Two weeks later we would break up a 6 year old relationship. Somehow I summoned the courage to watch the movie by myself. Throughout the movie, I realized I was zoning out at many parts. Not sure if it was because I didn’t want to invest myself too much into it. But when this scene came along, I froze. It felt REAL. It felt familiar, sort of bringing me a sense of deja vu. And it stunk. In the way that it reflected that we, humans, are fragile and imperfect and many times we just can’t overcome challenges with grace.
Man, that scene was intense. It reminded me of every time my parents argued.
I tend to agree with Jared in many ways.
I saw the movie first not really knowing anything and by the time I viewed it the second time I had read about the director’s affair with Gerwig, that Dern’s lawyer is modeled on a well known female lawyer that handled MULTIPLE divorces of both Dern’s and Johansson. I mean the whole thing soured for me a bit despite the acting and overall success of the film. Like- what are you trying to tell me? That divorce is gut wrenchingly difficult but most of the cast has done it a couple times and using those experiences to be cathartic for whom?
I liked the scene, and agree that within the context of the film as a whole, it works well and is an understandable explosion of emotions and feelings. But I also felt it revealed a couple of the film's limitations. The scene is a bit set-piece-y, and I found a number of the scenes were like that. And I don't quite buy the chemistry between Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson: excellent though they both are individually, they don't quite feel like ex-lovers to me - their chemistry is more that of siblings.
Charlie is the villain in the movie. Period.
Too many people here in this thread fail to have the slightest understanding of acting, of film. Jesus' comment...boy, that's sad. Comments like that are as genuinely whiny and malicious as some of the memes..and hey I can like a meme.
I know, you shouldn't begrudge someone their opinion..but I know sometimes you can, so appreciate the effort I just put in.
And hey, anytime one openly prefers one kind of thing over another (in film), as a point of reference, then it leads to this kind of hollow irreverence (memes) and opinions (bullshit).
Too many of you so-called film lovers wanna are like the British talking about football...
🤮 (emoji for a meme)
One's feelings on this, or any other film, are welcome.
I have a big problem with the film's attempt at de-sainting Charlie. Both ghe obvious thing and the end, when he walks into that house after all that (overkill at the end), and he could die and be John Doe.
But, the film asks so many questions, and has this ^^^ remarkable scene that makes the experience so real.
If you don't think Driver nails it...well Driver nails it. One of the great performances of this century.
I'm sure the "set-piece-y" or slightly stagey quality is intentional - it appears quite prominently in "Mistress America" too, among other Baumbach films. And it makes sense. This is a film about show business people, one of them from the theater world, negotiating and processing personal discord, so scenes are dramatized through an aesthetic lens that reflects that.
I'm v surprised at this backlash!
Here in Asia, Marriage Story is held in v regards n this scene rec'v exceptionally high praises fr many reviewers, esp those who were previously in a rship n had experienced separation.
This scene was singled out as raw, authentic n totally heartfelt. Both leads r unanimously praised as at the top o their game n r touted as the hot contenders to winning the Oscars, juz behind Judy n Joker.
I dun ustand this narrative to keep tearing a movie apart n finding faults at every corner. Is this the new trend in Hollywood now?? To diss at every acclaimed movies so as to..err..stand out fr the rest??
Claran;
That's what happens when everyone develops an opinion.
Claran: I'm not sure I see much tearing-apart or backlash in this thread - just reasoned discussions about the scene. We can critique it without it meaning that we hate it or the film.
I agree with Jesus. There was too much whining by an overpriveleged male about his expensive divorce from his shallow, selfish, superficial wife, although the second hour improves considerably. Scarlett Johansson is superb, but I also agree that Driver here is just ok, not a patch on his white-hot work in The Report.
Revolutionary Road did it better.
Ken S...
Come on, bruh. You're trying too hard and falling quite flat.
Bruhs and Sisses
Believe in Jesus and not in Me
No one believes in you, Ken.