MARRIAGE STORY Review

"She's a mother who plays. Really plays."

"I listen. I play. I put in the time."

The first line occurs very early in Noah Baumbach's Marriage Story while the second comes later-after much change has occurred in the lives of the characters speaking these lines. These lines come from two different characters, but they represent equal recognition of this intangible, but truly difficult quality to possess. It is in this simple connection-this acknowledgement in an admirable sense-that we know from the beginning no matter how ugly things get between Charlie (Adam Driver) and Nicole (Scarlett Johansson) that they will somehow be mature enough to find those lasting connections, those things that transcend their own relationship, that will allow them to find a common ground not only for the sake of their child, Henry (Azhy Robertson), but for the sake of their continued love story-even if the romance of that love lapsed long ago.

Marriage Story is in fact a love story, but a love story told through the lens of divorce that takes these two people we come to know on a very precise and personal level that we then watch fall further and further away from one another. The rigmarole of divorce turns things into a very impersonal process overrun by other people's opinions and agendas leaving Charlie and Nicole to ultimately find a way to figure things out on their own...doing so through that kernel of a connection the viewer trusts remains between them. Of course, said connections are more apparent to the viewer as some of Baumbach's best writing and directing moments here come when we see either of the two leads true emotions come to the surface outside of the presence of their former partner; each of them becoming what they needed to be for themselves and for one another while they were married after the fact.

SHE'S THE MAN: Ten Years Later

Ten years ago I was beginning my second semester of college, working thirty hours or so a week at Wendy's and increasingly enjoying more and more movies in my free time. My schedule throughout the week was decent as I only had class on Tuesdays and Thursdays while working the other three days to get a solid enough paycheck to sustain my mostly free weekends. Still, if there was a way to save money I would certainly take advantage of such opportunities and one of the ways to do so was to enjoy $5 Tuesdays at my locally owned movie theater. They also had a deal where, if you brought your own bowl on Thursdays, they would fill it up with popcorn for you. This popcorn deal of course spawned several interesting stories, but to the more pertinent point I was reminded of such movie-going experiences because over the last few weeks I've seen a number of anniversary articles about films that are turning twenty this year. While prestigious fare like Fargo and the now more affectionately rendered The Birdcage make for understandable reflections I was only nine in 1996 and therefore could only comment on something like Disney's stop-motion James and the Giant Peach (trust me, I checked) feature that I remember enjoying as a child, but probably haven't seen since 1997. And so, I bumped things up a decade to the year where I went to the theater consistently on Tuesday nights, for $5 dollars, and every now and then stumbled upon something more enjoyable than I might have expected particularly in these early months of the year.