Splitsville: Screwball Comedy About 'Open' Relationships That Crack Wide Open
By Karen Gordon
Rating: B+
Sometimes a movie that starts weirdly, and makes you think, “Uh-oh,” somehow ends well.
That is true for the charming screwball comedy Splitzville, which played the Cannes Film Festival this past spring.
The film is part buddy comedy, part rom-com, and partly just good natured silliness, but it coheres. It’s entertaining enough that you can just go with it, but there is depth there, if you’re so inclined. It says a few meaningful things about relationships without becoming a self-help class.
And it has heart and charm in spades.
Michael Angelo Covino, Kyle Marvin, Adria Arjona, Dakota Johnson
Splitzville is the reunion of collaborators Michael Angelo Covino and Kyle Marvin. Covino directed, co-wrote and co-stars with Marvin. This is their first since 2020’s The Climb (which our Kim Hughes reviewed).
The two movies have things in common. Like The Climb, Splitzville is built around two buddies, and mix that deep abiding friendship with a healthy dose of projection and competition.
When the film begins, Carey (Marvin) and his wife Ashley (Adria Arjona) are happily (sort of) driving down the highway on their way to visit their friends, his lifelong pal Paul (Covino) and his wife, Julie (Dakota Johnson) at their beach house.
They witness a car accident, and pull over to help. The experience sobers the couple, and in the dampened mood, Ashley admits to having had an affair (or two) and asks for a divorce. They’ve been married for just over a year. Carey freaks out and literally runs to Paul and Julie for some comfort and perspective.
Paul and Julie have been married longer, have an elementary school aged son, Russ (Simon Webster), and live well. Julie is a potter, Paul is a real estate developer in New York. Their beach house is beautiful. Understated modern architecture, and casually quiet furnishings that speaks of financial well-being, and a calm stable marriage.
As part of consoling Carey about infidelities, they casually reveal that they have agreed to an open marriage, which they feel is a big part of the secret to their happiness. Carey is surprised, but they tell him that what they have together is more important than worrying about fidelity. There’s an effortless confidence to their world.
But, as Carey discovers, the reality is a bit different.
The next morning, Paul’s gone. He’s back in New York, ostensibly to work on a major deal that keeps hitting snags. Julie thinks that’s hokum, and that Paul is using the excuse of the business, to keep going into the city to conduct an affair. She confesses that she hasn’t taken advantage of their open marriage agreement. But that’s about to change. For reasons that seem unclear (to us), she hits on Carey and the two have a night together.
When Paul returns, Carey, has a kind of innocence about him, tells Paul what happened. Paul freaks out, and that turns into a physical fight between the two men that does more damage to furniture, decor, and an unfortunate aquarium, than to either of them. It's terrifically fun. But it’s also the beginning of a lot of wonkiness, and revealed truths.
There's a lot going on, and a lot of balls in the air. and Covino, in his role as director, does a really good job at finding the right tone, the right pace to make it all work.
Still there are, as noted, some things that don’t totally work. In the opening scene, Carey and Ashley, who have been married for 14 months, are having the kind of conversation that makes you wonder if they’ve ever actually had a conversation. They don’t seem to know each other’s moods or moves very well. Not to mention that she seems totally out of his league.
Arjona (who is also an executive producer) has terrific comedic chops, and her character manages to be both warm and a bit crazy, in the best way. Like Paul and Carey, she’s also feeling her way through life, trying to figure out who she is, and, how much of herself to throw away for the sake of some kind of happiness that she hasn’t yet defined.
The one character who seems fully formed is Julie., And the film really benefits from the casting of Dakota Johnson (also a producer here), who brings a solid, intelligence to the role.
Covino and Martin have no doubt written this as a showpiece for themselves, but it never feels like a vanity project. They use Spltizville to explore ideas about relationships, for sure. But also about ordinary men, friendships, competitiveness, and how men mask insecurities, or try to; and sometimes play-act the role of who they think they should be.
Their characters are vulnerable and funny, but also, in their own weird way, grounded.
Splitzville. Directed by Michael Angelo Covino, written by Covino and Kyle Martin. Starring Dakota Johnson, Adria Arjona, Michael Angelo Covino, Kyle Martin, and Simon Webster. In theatres August 29.