State of the Union

No one said you have to move out.

If one partner cheats (Louise), the other might move out (Tom). But if there are children involved (in this case, two), the relationship isn’t over. The go-to solution these days is couples therapy. Louise and Tom meet every week at a bar to get in the right frame of mind for their upcoming session. After all, despite everything, they agree on three things: the other person is to blame, they don’t want to break up, and no crisis is so bad that they’d pass up the chance to get one over on the other with a snide remark.  At “their” bar, they discuss everything that’s been swept under the rug and is now being dredged up by therapy. And these are things most couples are familiar with in one form or another, but have certainly never seen presented in such a funny way.

With his special knack for likable antiheroes, Nick Hornby shows us in “State of the Union” (“Nobody Said You Had to Move Out”) the funny and touching sides of a marital crisis through the lens of a perfectly ordinary married couple.