Splitsville (15)

A bizarre car accident provides the unlikely catalyst for Ashley to ask her shell-shocked husband Carey for a divorce. He seeks refuge with good friends Julie and Paul, who reveal that they are in an open marriage and this arrangement has kept their relationship afloat. Paul is called away to attend to an urgent business matter in Manhattan. He leaves behind his wife and Carey to deal with a stressful incident and once the adrenaline rush abates, Carey and Julie have sex.

LondonNet Film Review

Splitsville (15) Film Review from LondonNet

A bizarre car accident provides the unlikely catalyst for Ashley (Adria Arjona) to ask her shell-shocked husband Carey (Marvin) for a divorce. He wallows in self-denial, offering to forgive her cheating, and seeks refuge with good friends Julie (Dakota Johnson) and Paul (Covino), who reveal that they are in an open marriage and this arrangement has kept their relationship afloat. “You two could sleep together and it wouldn’t bother me”, casually observes Paul as the trio share drinks on a sofa.

Paul is called away to attend to an urgent business matter in Manhattan, which Julie believes is an excuse for her husband to enjoy one of their sanctioned dalliances. He leaves behind his wife and Carey to deal with a stressful incident involving a stolen jet ski. Once the adrenaline rush abates, Carey and Julie take Paul at his word and have sex. Once Paul returns from New York and learns how open his wife has been with their good friend, seeds of jealousy take root and Julie tries in vain to prevent full-blown civil war between the two men. Temporarily admitting defeat, Paul concedes that Carey is a great guy and his wife could do worse. “I have,” she observes.

Splitsville is a wilfully unconventional snapshot of contemporary, sex-positive relationships, which invites characters to have their cakes and eat them … until everyone realises they have bitten off more than they can comfortably chew. Covino and Marvin are good friends off screen and that familiarity feeds their on-screen dynamic, particularly when the actors perform their own messy fight scene without any stunt doubles, pile-driving each other through wooden furniture or hitting each other for real when a clever camera can’t conceal the blow landing.

Laughs are gentle but frequent in a freewheeling script that navigates the tangled messes of two relationships without resorting to a glut of genre cliches. Some on-screen partner permutations are more endearing than others but film-makers take great delight in pushing characters’ boundaries, even when it doesn’t make sense for them to be forgiving, forgetting or repeating past mistakes.

– Jo Planter