JakeBaker’s review published on Letterboxd:
Disclaimer for the rest of 2019: As 2019 comes to a close, I’ll be watching and catching up on a lot of films to round out my year ranked list. Because of that, reviews will be shorter than usual. As always, thanks for reading and keeping up with my work!
Marriage Story is probably the most brutally honest film of 2019. With so much to love about Marriage Story, there’s just as much heartbreak. This film left me exhausted and empty. It all just feels too real, whether it’s just a slight and single tear running down Scarlett Johansson’s face or Adam Driver being brought to his worst fears to the brink of collapse, it’s all valid. You’re truly able to understand what both are going through and how nasty the legal process can get behind a divorce.
This is all so greatly executed by Johansson, Driver, and writer and director Noah Baumbach. The performances and the writing and directing all give Marriage Story so much depth and detail and yet feels very simple at the same time. Everyone here is at their very best.
My only flaw with the film is that the editing can sometimes feel over-edited. For most of the runtime, the editing aids itself extremely well to the characters and the tension created but there are times where it doesn’t add anything at all. Besides that, Marriage Story did not disappoint in the slightest. Its realistic telling of a divorce within a family hits hard but the performances and work from Baumbach make it something special and worth revisiting.