Life After Divorce -- It’s More Than Complicated.

During Christmas, I examine my catalogs like a scientist studies slides under a microscope. While pondering what “less than $20” gift would be good for various stocking stuffers, I saw a “beautifully crafted” media console made from mahogany solids and veneers. To demonstrate its ability to contain one’s entire DVD stash – the catalog marketers had stocked the console with DVDs.  I turned the magazine sideways and strained my eyes. 

“What kind of movies would people who live in a Pottery Barn catalog watch,” I asked my husband.  I could make out familiar, easy choices like “Big,” the less erudite “Home Alone,” the left leaning “Milk,” and the right leaning “American Carol.”  In other words, perfectly balanced politically neutral people who love a good laugh.

But when I went to see Meryl Streep’s hilarious new movie “It’s Complicated,” I didn’t have to wonder any more what kind of people might inhabit the pages of my catalogs. Almost every scene is “Pottery Barn Porn” -- a cinematic explosion of good taste and stoneware. Though social science shows that divorce is devastating financially -- it's effects most strongly absorbed by women and children -- Jane lives a stylish and luxurious life.  (Supposedly she bought a picture perfect home right after her divorce, even though her main source of income is selling pastries.)  Is it a sign of getting older that I leaned over to my friend -- during a movie about divorce, remarriage, and affairs -- and whispered, “What a gorgeous table!” (Forget Pottery Barn -- that perfectly weathered dining table for 8 just had to be custom made!)

While she might have a table that would make Julia Child jealous, Jane Adler (Streep) isn’t perfect.  Her 19 year marriage ended ten years ago, but she and her ex-husband Jake (Alec Baldwin) have a finally figured out how to coexist in an amicable relationship. Jane runs a bakery in Southern California. Jake’s a Porsch-driving lawyer with a trophy wife, Agness (Lake Bell). Jake and Jane’s son’s graduation in New York, however, brings Jake and Jane together again. They find themselves in a bar, then the bed, after ten years apart.

The mostly female audience laughed hysterically during many scenes, including when Jane insisted Jake turn around so he wouldn’t see her unclothed.   

“Why?” he asked.

“The last time you saw me naked, I was in my forties.  I look different when I stand up now.”

Of course, this new turn of events -- “adultery” as Jane calls it -- makes her “the other woman.”  Plus, to complicate matters even more, Jake’s new wife has a young son. In other words, he’s cheating on an entirely new family… just as he had years before.

The movie (with its copper pots and stoneware) are more than just “Pottery Barn Porn,” however  – it’s emotional porn for middle aged women.  Jane, after all, is a wonderful mother, a sexually attractive lover and a successful business woman – all without plastic surgery.  Even though she’s nearing sixty, she has to balance the attention of two attractive men… one of whom chooses her over this twenty-something, hard bodied wife.

Plus, she has great kids.  

Sadly, real children of divorced parents statistically perform more poorly in reading, spelling, and math and are have lower rates of college graduation than those with married parents.  But Jake and Jane’s son is cute, gets along well with his siblings, and is graduating from an undoubtedly prestigious New York college.  

In fact -- even though kids of divorced parents have more health, behavioral, drug use, and emotional problems --Jane's three children (whom she raised without a father) are all grown up and seemingly well-adjusted people.  

Or are they?

The movie uses adultery as a comedic device, to show the importance of an intact family.  Several poignant scenes show Jake standing on the outside of the family he left, looking longingly into the picture-perfect scene… not quite able to enter in.  Though he tries. Like Humpty Dumpty, their family -- once broken – cannot be put back together.

When their three adult kids find out that their parents are back together, they don’t have the jubilant response Jake expects.  Instead, they burst into tears. 

“We’re not even over the divorce yet!”

To the producers' credit, the divorce in “It’s Complicated,” produces awful consequences.  Unfaithfulness is painful and the family is shown as a valuable, safe place… something not to discard lightly.  But even though the movie does a great job of portraying adultery as a family-breaking bad decision, Jake and Jane don’t suffer the way most divorcees suffer. They live in a perfectly balanced world where the effects of bad decisions are mitigated by wealth, good humor, and an amazing vegetable garden.

If it were a more realistic portrayal of divorce, it would’ve been called “It’s Devastating.”

But I’m not sure anyone would choose to pay $10 to see that.

“It’s Complicated” is rated R for some drug content and sexuality.