The Squid and the Whale (2005)
#75 in my 2007 movie challenge was Noah Baumbach’s Squid and the Whale. I’d avoided watching this. While I heard it was good, I also was rarely in the mood for a depressing divorce movie. But it’s been mentioned so many times recently, since Baumbach has a new film out soon, that I felt it was time to check it out. I’m glad I did. This is a dry, darkly funny and very moving film. The acting is across-the-board outstanding, and the characters complex. It was hard to watch the toll the divorce took on the two young sons without squirming, though. The quirky script and well-chosen music reminded me of Wes Anderson, so I wasn’t surprised to see his name in the credits as a producer.
November 15th, 2007 at 12:53 am
Finally saw this a couple weeks ago myself. It certainly had its moments (although I had heard of many before, which I think robs the experience if you are a late-comer to a movie. Felt the same way about “Lost in Translation.) Linney and Daniels were great. To me, the whole father and older son converging and diverging held it all together. And I had “Hey You” stuck in my head the whole next week.