Squid and the Whale, The (Noah Baumbach, 2005)
This is the story of the divorce of Noah Baumbach's parents—as Marriage Story is a version of his own—so its appeal is far from universal. You have to be able to identify with (a member of) a family in which the parents are writers and an academic (not to mention white and middle-class—and American).
Despite myself being four out of five of the above (I'm not American) even I found this to be of very little interest. There's very little warmth in either of the parents, and both of the sons seem a bit more than just unhappy (I mean they're a bit mad).
Noah Baumbach >
I single out Jesse Eisenberg once again, as being a deficit in any movie in which I've seen him. His face is a persona - a mask - betraying no humanity. I suspect that the actor is neurotic, or on the autism spectrum. Whatever ... he is just as useless in this as he is in Cafe Society, and maybe The Social Network - tho I've mostly forgotten that. (I now learn from Wikipedia that he admits to having OCD. I think there's more in the DSM that could be applied to him.)
Garry Gillard | reviews | New: 3 February, 2020 | Now: 3 February, 2020