The Squid and the Whale

I mused as I watched this movie, they were married in 1969, and 17 years later, in 1986, they found themselves only able to get a divorce. I married in 1968, and 17 years later, in 1985, I was also getting a divorce. Like that couple, I don't think I ever knew for sure why.

Jeff Daniels is Bernard Berkman, professor and author who was absolutely manipulative, of his students, his wife, their sons -- whatever it took to get past the moment. He loved no one, not even himself, and got great joy out of such conquests as beating his young son in ping-pong. And giving his teenage son advice to play the field, women are objects for the pleasure of men.

Laura Linney is Bernard's wife Joan. After she found out that she could be a successful writer, she began to tire of her husband's overbearing ways. But she too was weak, and had been having an affair for several years. That they broke up was not the fault of either. They grew in different directions and were unable to see the situation realistically. That probably is the most common symptom of this kind of breakup.

Caught in the middle are the two sons, Walt and Frank. Walt, the teen, idolizes his dad, and in a very shallow manner talks scholarly about things he has not taken the time to read. He "composes" a song for a school talent show, wins the prize, but it is discovered that he took a song that had already been written. When asked why, he responded, "I could have written that song. The fact that someone else did was just a technicality."

For the most part the movie is very unusual, but also very well written and interesting. Here we have these flawed people trying to navigate through this family mess, and somehow they seem they will survive. It has a nice touch of realism through it, and is also very funny at times.

The title comes from's Walt's fear, as a small child, of the squid and whale exhibit at the museum.

"The Squid and the Whale" is such a corrosive look at marriage and child rearing that it could inspire a backlash among parents to ban arts education, if not literacy altogether, from the schools in order to prevent their children from revenging upon them as much as writer/director Noah Baumbach does on his family, notwithstanding the usual closing disclaimer of fiction.

Almost as raw as the old PBS documentary series "An American Family," it is such a savage look at divorce that it could also be used to discourage people from getting married in the first place, let alone having kids or considering moving to a kibbutz where the kids would be raised communally. Evidently it was cathartic for Baumbach as he did get married when the film was completed (and his now spouse is thanked in the credits).

Produced by Wes Anderson, it seems like the nonfiction inspiration for "The Royal Tenenbaums," with urban, urbane siblings who aspire to be a writer and a tennis pro. The tennis, and ping pong, images repeat continuously throughout as the kids are bounced back and forth between the parents in a very negative portrayal of competitive joint custody, where even a parent moving close by is torture - "The other side of the park - is that even in Brooklyn?", vividly demonstrating how small a kid's world is.

Baumbach has clearly studied Woody Allen movies, also in smoothly incorporating very funny lines, and he uses Brooklyn, specifically the Park Slope neighborhood, like Allen uses Manhattan, street by street, subway stop by subway stop, though this surely will reinforce every prejudice the rest of the country has against raising kids in the city. I doubt out-of-towners will understand the karmic significances of looking for and finding a parking space. The final scenes in Manhattan seem an intentionally cathartic solution as in "Saturday Night Fever."

Jeff Daniels plays an even more obnoxious father as writer than Jeff Bridges in "The Door in the Floor" (ironically, as Daniels says he's frequently mistaken for Bridges by fans). He is frighteningly judgmental, hypercritical, selfish, competitive and all around emotional abuser, and out and out neglectful, though I'm not sure Oprah would do a show about this kind of abuse. He has absolutely no sense of appropriate boundaries between his pre-adolescent/adolescent sons and himself, and involves them in way too adult views that damage how they can be age appropriate. (Though it is a bit too arch to have his writing career be on the skids while his wife's begins to flourish.)

This is one of the few films about kids I've seen lately where the use of profanity is appropriately shocking as in this hyper articulate family it is emblematic of the family's break down in communication as the kids blithely parrot what they hear at home without understanding much of what they are talking about.

The younger generation handles scabrous lines of detailed dialog magnificently. Jesse Eisenberg had to endure similarly nasty lessons about male-female relationships in "Roger Dodger" and takes it a step further here. Owen Kline, Kevin's talented son, handles with aplomb scenes that reveal quite more about pre-adolescent boys than most females, even their mothers, may comfortably want to explicitly know goes on. The lacerating men and women of "Closer" at least didn't have kids and in "We Don't Live Here Anymore" (with another tempted college professor) the kids were fairly obliviously very young. This film very clearly illuminates how brutal deteriorating parental relationships are on older children, particularly in how they relate to the opposite sex. I assume we're supposed to feel positive at the end that the kids' cries for help are finally being heard, but I'm not sure the parents have grown or changed.

The other kids in smaller parts are also very natural. Laura Linney's beauty is downplayed for some reason. She doesn't usually get to be maternal in films and she shows that warmth in lovely ways here. I'm pretty sure William Baldwin's character is intended to be both bland and annoying. Anna Paquin doesn't get much to work with as the usual student temptress in the plot, though she brings a certain ditsy cheerfulness to the role.

The music is wonderful, including a score by Britta Phillips and Dean Wareham of Luna. A Loudon Wainwright song, who has written extensively of similar father/son issues, closes over the credits. Pink Floyd figures in the plot and it is a bit hard to believe that the parents of Park Slope in 1985 were not familiar with Roger Waters.

This is not a date movie -- unless you want to break up with the person afterwards or tell your spouse you want a divorce or tell your significant other you definitely never want to have kids.

This movie is a good film, that's for sure. The actors perform brilliantly and the script is original and touching. However, all this is boring.

I guess people with an interest in the social aspect of one's life will find this very nice and good. For the parents (and children) who are on the same path as the character, should they choose to really understand the movie, it will be a learning experience that will save them from a lot of pain and anguish.

OK, the guy is a cowardly hypocrite that hides behind his intellectual aura tons of frustration and, surely enough, stupidity. The woman leaves a life of discomfort and maybe even fear, but lacks the courage to do anything about it. She cheats on the husband then leaves clues to it, so that the responsibility of the divorce would fall on him. The sons pick sides based on age, both mimicking behaviour that they don't understand yet, and thus making fools of themselves. Very weird and socially tense situations, but that's it. After the first half an hour you know everything there is to know, only the awkward situations remain, in a hostile, not humorous manner.

The ending is as devoid of resolution as the entire content. The problems are there, you know what, where, when and how, but there is no solution. In the end, the film is nothing but a portrait, you either like it or you don't.

Not being a child from a product of divorce, after seeing this movie I can appreciate the push and pull that manifests from divorce. Now, I am positive that not all broken homes are this broken, but Noah Baumbauch creates an environment that makes you squirm and want to cry all at the same time. All of the performances are near perfection and are executed with utmost conviction. I find that Jeff Daniels is one of those actors who get better with every movie he does. He is completely unlikeable in this movie yet you feel for him and you want him to get it together. Very few actors can play a prick and yet you are rooting for him and there are a few points in the film where you even buy into his bullshit as much as his oldest son (played by Jesse Eisenberg) does. The Squid and The Whale is not the most uplifting of fare, but it is a must view for anybody who appreciates film, not movies, film.

More acutely than I've experienced in a long time, this film captures the process of personality inheritance within families. The interaction/influence between Bernard and Walt is almost painful to watch at times, but it's completely rich. Beyond just that father/son dynamic, the story is so poignant without ever getting sappy - a true accomplishment for a family drama involving divorce. Nothing hits you over the head. Nothing seems too forced. While there's plenty of confusion, discomfort, and alienation, a sense of love shines through, and I couldn't help but get attached to all of the characters. I recommend this film unconditionally.