—LILAH RAMZI
Hollywood’s fortunes may be tied to comic-
book spectacle these days, but this month’s
best films prove there’s room for chamber pieces too. Two
people talking! That’s all it takes sometimes—and nowhere
more so than in Noah Baumbach’s staggeringly moving
Marriage Story (a Netflix film, which opens theatrically
this month and then arrives on the streaming service in
early December). Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson play
a Brooklyn playwright and a Los Angeles–born movie
actress whose marriage has run aground, a scenario that
offers unavoidable comparisons to Baumbach’s own split
from Jennifer Jason Leigh. Neither wants a messy divorce,
but Baumbach’s film—achingly
compassionate and ferociously
uncompromising—shows the way
good intentions can devolve
into passive aggression, out-and-out
recriminations, and high-priced
lawyers. All the while their eight-year-old is on the
sidelines—a desperately sad witness. The film is an acting
showcase, and Johansson and Driver have never been
better: mournful, ferocious, bewildered by regrets.
Marriage Story is a movie you brace for. The Two Popes,
another Netflix film with a theatrical release followed by a
small-screen debut, is one to revel in. File this brilliantly
sophisticated two-hander among movies-that-sound-boring-
but-definitely-aren’t. Based on true events, it amounts to a
lengthy discussion between the titular popes, played by the
inimitable Jonathan Pryce, as Pope Francis, and Anthony
tay lor antrim
MOVIES
Power Couples
Succession and dissolution
unfold in two new films.
MISSING LINK
SIMKHAI DESIGNED HARDWARE-
STREWN PRINTS LIKE THIS
NEVER-ENDING CHAIN DESIGN.
ARTIST’S PALETTE
“HELEN FRANKENTHALER’S WORK
[INCLUDING ADRIATIC, ABOVE]
HAPPY DAYS
ABOVE: SCARLETT
JOHANSSON AND
ADAM DRIVER IN
NOAH BAUMBACH’S
MARRIAGE STORY.
VLIFE
68 NOVEMBER 2019 VOGUE.COM
CHLOE AND HALLE: STEVE GRANITZ/GETTY IMAGES. PAINTING: HELEN FRANKENTHALER.
ADRIATIC,
1968. ACRYLIC ON CANVAS, 132-1/8 X 93 IN.© 2019
HELEN FRANKENTHALER FOUNDATION, INC. ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY (ARS), NEW YORK. AGE FOTOSTOCK. SUITCASES: STD/GETTY IMAGES. FLIGHT ATTENDANT: HULTON ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES. CHAIN: DSKALEX/ISTOCK/GETTY IMAGES PLUS. MOVIES: WILSON WEBB/NETFLIX.
