The Story of Us
USA 1999
Reviewed by Geoffrey Macnab
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
Los Angeles, the present. Ben and Katie Jordan have been married for 15 years. He's a writer, carefree and spontaneous. She works as a crossword compiler. They maintain the façade of a happy relationship for the sake of their two kids, - Josh, aged 12, and Erin, aged 10 - but the cracks are beginning to show.
During the summer, while the kids are sent away to camp, Ben and Katie agree to a trial separation. Ben moves out of the family's suburban house. During their time apart, they reflect on their marriage, what they loved about each other and what went wrong between them. When they visit the kids in camp, they sleep in separate beds. Ben and Katie have dinner together and it looks as if they've recaptured their old spark. They go upstairs to the bedroom, but before they can sleep with one another they begin squabbling again.
They agree to a divorce and plan to meet the kids on the bus back from summer camp, take them out to dinner and tell about the split. But while waiting for the bus to arrive, Katie decides she can't go through with the divorce. She realises she still loves Ben. The family is reunited, seemingly now at last happy.
Review
With The Story of Us, Rob Reiner attempts the near-impossible: to make an upbeat romantic comedy about a marital breakdown. The film begins misleadingly. Early on, when Ben addresses the camera directly as if talking to his therapist, he seems to be discussing a relationship which is already over. Just to emphasise how bleak the prospects are for the once-loving couple, Reiner plays a lugubrious Eric Clapton ballad again and again on the soundtrack. "I wonder if there's anything more horrible than a man and wife who hate each other," Strindberg once wrote. The problem with The Story of Us is that Bruce Willis and Michelle Pfeiffer don't feel any animosity for one another. "Fighting became the language of the relationship," we're told, but we wait in vain for the pot-smashing, drunken spats and vicious insults which usually come with Scenes from a Marriage-style dramas. Instead, Reiner throws in some cutesy dinner-table scenes, in which mom and pop play at domestic harmony for the sake of the kids, and one or two sequences in which they sit around discussing their love lives with their slick, superficial friends. In their bright little corner of affluent, suburban LA, nobody suffers much. Pfeiffer is grumpy Willis leaves her to do most of the organising and housework. ("I'm sick and tired of being the designated driver in this marriage," she complains.) Willis, for his part, is exasperated at how strait-laced she has become. This, it seems, is grounds enough for separation.
In some ill-judged flashbacks, we see the couple in their courtship days. To signal how carefree and happy they were way back then, both sport peculiar hairstyles. (Willis looks like a band member from Reiner's earlier comedy This is Spinal Tap while Pfeiffer is all unflattering curls.) In one redundant interlude, we see them go to Venice to try to reignite their romance. Reiner can't resist picture-postcard shots of them dancing at dawn by the lagoon or playing footsie on a gondola. The point seems to be that relationships don't break down in blazing rows. It's the little things - irritating habits, domestic oversights - which cause them to come unstuck. Couples grow apart almost without noticing it. This may be so, but it doesn't make for an exciting movie. To pep matters up, Reiner therefore throws in some slapstick (tugs of war with the kids, lovemaking on the kitchen table) and wheels on several eccentric marriage-guidance counsellors for comic relief. The star casting doesn't help. It is hard to accept Willis and Pfeiffer as an ordinary couple, struggling with everyday problems.
Nothing is at stake. Pfeiffer starts seeing another man but the relationship is never serious. Willis moves into his own apartment, where he broods over his laptop and learns to do his own shopping. The question isn't whether they'll get back together but when. Shorn of tension, the movie meanders along in its own bland, enervating way to its pre-ordained conclusion. Prettily shot, well-enough acted, it ends up seeming utterly inconsequential.
Credits
- Director
- Rob Reiner
- Producers
- Rob Reiner
- Jessie Nelson
- Alan Zweibel
- Screenplay
- Alan Zweibel
- Jessie Nelson
- Director of Photography
- Michael Chapman
- Editors
- Robert Leighton
- Alan Edward Bell
- Production Designer
- Lilly Kilvert
- Music/Music Producer
- Eric Clapton
- ©CR Films, LLC
- Production Companies
- Warner Bros. presents in association with Castle Rock Entertainment
- Executive Producers
- Jeffrey Stott
- Frank Capra III
- Associate Producer
- Tammy Glover
- Production Supervisors
- Carl S. Griffin
- Italy Unit:
- Giovanni Lovatelli
- Production Controller
- Julie Jones
- Production Co-ordinators
- Diane Ward
- Italy Unit:
- Gabriella Di Santo
- Venice Co-ordinator
- Italy Unit:
- Anita Tomaselli
- Unit Production Manager
- Jeffrey Stott
- Unit Manager
- Italy Unit:
- Marco Olivieri
- Location Managers
- Ken Haber
- Lori Balton
- Location Supervisor
- Italy Unit:
- Rosanna Roditi
- Assistant Directors
- Frank Capra III
- Todd Y. Murata
- Ken Wada
- Italy Unit:
- Bojana Sutic
- Emanuela Minoli
- Script Supervisor
- Kerry Lyn McKissick
- Casting
- Jane Jenkins
- Voice:
- Leigh French
- Camera Operators
- Daniel Gold
- Gregory Lundsgaard
- Italy Unit:
- Giovanni Gebbia
- Steadicam Operators
- Gregory Lundsgaard
- Italy Unit:
- Giovanni Gebbia
- Visual Effects Supervisor
- Charles Gibson
- Special Effects Co-ordinator
- Paul Lombardi
- Computer Design
- Supervisor:
- Liz Radley
- Consultant:
- Mark J. Olson
- Art Directors
- Chris Burian-Mohr
- Jess Gonchor
- Italy:
- Francesco Chianese
- Set Designers
- John Perry Goldsmith
- Anthony D. Parrillo
- Supervising Set Decorator
- Gretchen Rau
- Set Decorators
- Sarah Jackson Burt
- Kathy Lucas
- Italy Unit:
- Francesca Caccavale
- Illustrator
- Daren R. Dochterman
- Costume Designer
- Shay Cunliffe
- Costume Supervisor
- Cheryl Blackwell Beasley
- Wardrobe Supervisor
- Italy Unit:
- Paolo Scalabrino
- Make-up Department Head
- Michael Germain
- Make-up Artists
- Deborah LaMia Denaver
- Melanie Levitt
- Body Make-up
- Jene Fielder
- Make-up Artists
- Italy Unit:
- Fabrizio Sforza
- Alessandra Sampaolo
- Head Hairstylist
- Candace Neal
- Hairstylists
- Romy Fleming
- Italy Unit:
- Mirella Ginnoto
- Carla Ruffert
- Main Titles Design/Production
- Imaginary Forces
- Kyle Cooper
- Titles/Opticals
- Pacific Title/Mirage
- Music Co-writer/Co-producer
- Marc Shaiman
- Music Programming
- Nick Vidar
- Conductor/Orchestrations
- Jeff Atmajian
- Music Editor
- Scott Stambler
- Music Recordist/Mixer
- Tim Boyle
- Music Consultant
- Arlene Fishbach
- Soundtrack
- "(I) Get Lost", "Wonderful Tonight" by Eric Clapton; "It's Good Enough for Rock n' Roll" by Gilby Clarke; "I'm So Excited" by The Pointer Sisters; "The Sheik of Araby" by Teddy Wilson; "Keepin' out of Mischief Now" by Ruby Braff & His New England Songhounds; Leopold Mozart's "Adagio from Concerto in D for Trumpet & Orchestra" by Leipzig New Bach Collegium Musicum, conducted by Max Pommer, Ludwig Güttler (soloist); "Easy Living" by Matt Sinclair; Johann Sebastian Bach's "Bourée from Suite for Orchestra No 1 in C Major BMV 1066" by Camerata Romana, conducted by Eugen Duvier; "Classical Gas" by Mason Williams; "(I) Get Lost Re-mix" by Eric Clapton; "Don't Sit under the Apple Tree"; "Good Bless America"; "Roman Song"; "Saturday Night Is the Loneliest Night in the Week"; "Love Is a Many Splendored Thing"; "Get Happy"; "MacArthur Park"
- Sound Supervisor
- Robert Grieve
- Sound Mixer
- Robert Eber
- Re-recording Mixers
- Kevin O'Connell
- Greg P. Russell
- Re-recordists
- Dan Sharp
- Fred Peck III
- Dubbing Engineer
- Hanson Hsu
- Dialogue Editor
- Darren King
- Yann Delpuech
- ADR
- Loop Group:
- Jack Blessing
- Vanna Bonita
- Lorenzo Caccialanza
- William Calvert
- June Christopher
- Alfonso De Rose
- Cody Dorkin
- Chad Einbinder
- Nicholas Guest
- Matthew Howard
- Brie Larson
- Luisa Leschin
- Lindze Letherman
- Samantha McElroy
- Christie Mellor
- Jonathan Nichols
- Martita Palmer
- Phil Proctor
- Wendy Schaal
- Ruth Silveira
- Arnold Turner
- Gigi Vorgan
- Christopher Winsor
- Mixers:
- Jeff Gomillion
- Tom Meloeny
- Supervising Editor:
- Kimberly Harris
- Foley
- Supervisor:
- John Murray
- Editors:
- Steve Williams
- Dan Yale
- Cast
- Michelle Pfeiffer
- Katie Jordan
- Bruce Willis
- Ben Jordan
- Rita Wilson
- Rachel
- Julie Hagerty
- Liza
- Paul Reiser
- Dave
- Tim Matheson
- Marty
- Colleen Rennison
- Erin aged 10
- Jake Sandvig
- Josh aged 12
- Red Buttons
- Arnie
- Jayne Meadows
- Dot
- Tom Poston
- Harry
- Betty White
- Lillian
- Casey Boersma
- Josh aged 2 and a half
- Rob Reiner
- Stan
- Dylan Boersma
- Josh aged 3
- Ken Lerner
- Doctor Rifkin
- Victor Raider-Wexler
- Doctor Hopkins
- Albert Hague
- Doctor Siegler
- Daniel Henson
- Josh aged 7
- Tara Blanchard
- Erin aged 5
- Adam Zweibel
- camper
- Alan Zweibel
- Uncle Shelly
- Bill Kirchenbauer
- Andy Kirby
- Lucy Webb
- Joanie Kirby
- Jessie Nelson
- realtor
- Tommy Tang
- cooking teacher
- Yaping
- store clerk
- James J. Ritz
- maître d'
- Ryan Townsend
- Michael Chapman
- waiters
- Jordan Lund
- clergyman
- Robert Alan Beuth
- obstetrician
- Marci Rosenberg
- Sonia
- Art Evans
- George
- Renée Ridgeley
- Sara
- Matthew Moreno
- taxi driver
- Certificate
- 15
- Distributor
- Warner Bros Distributors (UK)
- 8,597 feet
- 95 minutes 32 seconds
- Dolby Digital/DTS/SDDS
- Colour by
- DeLuxe