Divorce, New York Movie-Style

That classic splitsville film, The Squid and the Whale, gets a close viewing by a born-and-bred New Yorker

By Gabe Leibowitz

 

The Squid and the Whale

Entangled: Walt (Jesse Eisenberg) ponders the giant squid-and-whale display at the American Museum of Natural History.
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August 1, 2024

I’d first seen The Squid and the Whale when it opened in 2005. Back then, I watched it twice—despite there being mere months from what would become my forever relationship (i.e., my marriage), and also despite the fact that I’d grown up in a household with parents (Herbert Leibowitz, a college professor and poetry magazine chief, and Susan Yankowitz, a playwright) who’d been, and still are, blissfully married since 1977—and who for many years edited and published Parnassus, a poetry review. So despite those “mitigating” factors, I was struck by how effortlessly Noah Baumbach, The Squid’s director, portrays the ripple-down effects of parental strife and anguish on the children, particularly when handled as clumsily as the key characters, Bernard (Jeff Daniels) and Joan (Laura Linney) do.

Watching it again 17 and a half years after my last viewing confirmed everything I’d initially thought: this is a tightly wound, uncomfortable, and at times cringe-worthy (in the best way possible) film, one that entirely avoids taking sides other than pointing out that there really aren’t any winners in a situation like this. What’s more, it candidly, loudly recommends that separating parents avoid conducting themselves as they do here, especially when their children are at a formative age. The acting remains splendid—the lead quartet of Daniels, Linney, plus a baby-faced Jesse Eisenberg and a spunky Owen Kline, as their sons—play off one another superbly. A divine Anna Paquin dives back into the supporting role she nailed in Spike Lee’s 25th Hour (2002)—the quick-witted, coquettish student whom much older highbrows can’t resist—and would repeat once again as the lead in Kenneth Lonergan’s astonishing Margaret (2011).

The Squid and the Whale

Culpable parents: A perturbed Bernard (Jeff Daniels) and a distressed Joan (Laura Linney) address Walt’s behavior issues at his school.
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As a lifelong New Yorker, I deeply appreciated how distinctly, well, how NYC, this film really is. There are many examples beyond two references to the Dicksteins, who, amazingly enough, were real-life friends of my parents for decades, frequently attending dinners and readings at our apartment. (Morris Dickstein was a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of English at the CUNY Graduate Center.) Yet there they were, on the big screen. References abound to the Knicks. (Bernard, who seems to take personal offense at anyone dismissing that team, finds it “really offensive” when he hears that they’re accused of playing “like thugs.”) Not to mention the conversations about how challenging it is to find a parking spot. So even without an enormous amount of life context, The Squid’s overarching ethos hit home in a deep, memorable way for me at the time.

But—I had literally begun my career as a real estate broker a mere six months earlier, at the age of 25, and couldn’t possibly have understood just how deeply the city where I was born, raised, and still live is embedded in Baumbach’s approach to the (autobiographical, clearly) subject matter at hand. The intellectual head space in which Bernard exists is one that’s entirely familiar to me, one where there’s a legitimate social discomfort in the conversations about cinema, literature, poetry—art of whatever kind. It’s all about close family members provoking one another to debate and flaunt their book knowledge, their experience, their encyclopedic recollections of a director’s filmography, or an author’s oeuvre. And that aforementioned head space can lead to nasty behavior when things go awry or someone’s comfort zone is disrupted.

The Squid and the Whale

Dysfunctional-family dynamics: The Berkmans clasp hands (each their own) as they face facts (or not).
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Bernard’s overinflated opinion of his own talents and writing skills contributes to his and Joan’s divorce and post-separation anger and resentment. His jealousy over her writing successes seeps into his conversations with the kids.

“Maybe mom will become famous instead,” says Kline’s Frank.

No, “dad’s the writer,” a defensive Walt (Eisenberg) retorts.

Taking sides isn’t really what you want to see in an even semi-healthy split. To his crush Sophie, (Halley Feiffer—a girl Walt briefly dated before falling for his dad’s dismissiveness), Walt spouts, “No, but it’s minor Fitzgerald [as in F. Scott]—an early indicator of his idolizing his severely-flawed father’s approach to interaction; Bernard, despite his liberal pontificating, possesses plenty of Trumpy qualities—viewing sexual prowess as a show of power (“You have plenty of time to sleep with gorgeous women”; dismissing Sophie as the equivalent of “fine”; despising losing to his own children at anything; unperturbed by Walt’s obvious feelings for Lili (Paquin) when she serves his ego so well; looking to pick fights via overcompensation; making excuses for everything under the sun; refusing to apologize in any genuine manner or admit to his own warts and actions.

These worlds exist outside of New York, of course. But in their prevalence on the Upper West Side (I grew up on 89th and Broadway, and spent an extensive period in brownstone Park Slope), but their prevalence on the Upper West Side makes these neighborhoods the very definition of sturdy bastions for this specific type of faux-progressive. Obviously, the vast, vast majority of intellectual UWS/Park Slopers are wonderful, smart, learned, and full of love! But the exceptions are remarkably similar in toxic traits, and I’ve encountered my fair share over the years, making The Squid and the Whale ring true in an uncannily vivid manner.

The Squid and the Whale

Battle Royale: In the final scene at the museum, Walt revisits the titular exhibit.
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And yet Baumbach does a terrific job avoiding painting Bernard as the true villain, even if his inadequacies trickle down to Walt (whose entire attitude until the admittedly a-bit-too-on-the-nose final scene is full of flailing attempts to emulate his dad—warning signs, and reality be damned) and often take up most of the air in the room. (Sense a pattern?) Joan, while understandably and rightfully finished with this life, is hardly blameless. She has constant affairs, including with people known to the family; she twists the knife as deeply as possible; and she speaks too bluntly at times, forcing her kids to hear details that they should not have been subjected to. But she’s human—and a woman who happens to be armed with a deeper sensitivity than Bernard’s and, arguably, with an inherent selflessness—which is why both kids, by the end, come around and see her as the lesser of two evils. (Frank, as noted above, was team Joan from the start.) And eventually, Walt learns the Max Fischer lesson (from Wes Anderson’s 1998 masterpiece Rushmore): it’s okay to be a child, even when you’re being asked to carry a heavier load than you should, due to familial factors, and succumbing to your actual age isn’t anything to be ashamed of. (In fact, the best exchange here reverberates back to a line in Rushmore, paraphrased: “Because if you didn’t love him, why did you ever marry him?” It’s impossible for a teenager, no matter how precocious, to understand how something that once was true isn’t any longer. To wit, Joan’s retort, on the money: “In Columbus, there was no one like your dad.”)

This is a wonderfully astute picture, one that would be memorable anywhere … but not in the same way if it was dragged away from New York and air-dropped somewhere, anywhere, else.

Gabe Leibowitz lives in Brooklyn with his wife, essentially-a-teen son, and their beautiful and goofy standard poodle, Sirius Black. Aside from functioning as a realtor, he’s an avid cinephile (whose movie reviews can be found on Letterboxd). Email: gabriel.leibowitz@elliman.com.

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