RIOTUS

Splitsville is a straight to Apple TV+ romantic dramedy about two sets of upper middle-class couples who would rather play relationship musical chairs among each other than sit with their spouse and express their true feelings. The movie is not a celebration of people who stay together, but a passive-aggressive farce that proposes people (whether as friends or as partners) would do much better being apart.  

The movie begins with new-ish married couple: unfailing accommodating Carey (played with aw shucks charisma by Kyle Marvin) and new agey Ashley (a captivatingly frustrating Adria Arjona) are out for a drive when Ashley asks Carey to do more than makeout in the front seat. What starts as an awkward attempt at intimacy turns into Ashley admitting she’s been cheating on Carey for most of their relationship. She asks for a divorce. A car crash happens ahead of them (which seems like an unlucky start to the end of a relationship). Carey is so shocked by the news the only way he can process it is to Forrest Gump his way to his best bro’s house Paul (a well played awful Michael Angelo Covino) for moral support. He and his wife, Julie (ever luminous Dakota Johnson)  reveal the key to a happy marriage is to be an open one (which is news to this married person of 20 years). Somehow Carey interprets their candor as permission to sleep with his best friend’s wife while Paul is on a “business trip”.  

Predictably this extramarital move is not fine and chaos erupts. Paul and Carey get into a knockout fight. It’s oddly reminiscent of Peter and the chicken from Family Guy where it begins weirdly serious (or is it just seriously weird?) until the violence escalates into widespread property destruction- Paul and Julie’s Architectural Digest worthy modern house. Like the phrase “people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones,” friends staying with friends in glass houses shouldn’t sleep with the other’s spouses unless they want to break someone’s trust or a kitchen table. I’ve seen Disney XD shows where the tween age cast is more emotionally mature than Splitsville‘s main characters. Being in denial is not maturity. If anyone within the quad cannot get the balls to care for each other why should the audience invest in its marital survival. 

a passive-aggressive farce that proposes people (whether as friends or as partners) would do much better apart.

Kat Bittner, RIOTUS

Splitsville is a missed opportunity on what could have been a more interesting story of a developing poly relationship (and the quirks of having consensual multiple romantic or sexual relationships within a group of people), but instead it turns into a dysfunctional polycule (a network of interconnected partners formed by various bonds like a social molecule). It feels even the bonds between each of the “main” couples Carey + Ashley, Paul + Julie, and Carey + Julie are not as complimentary or as funny as Julie + her parade of partners turned roommates. I’m partial to the boyish fuckboy Jackson (charmingly played by Charlie Gillespie) and gruff, but caring Fede (a  captivatingly frustrated David Castañeda). The way both characters wear their hearts on their sleeves and acknowledge the absurdity of the situation had me wishing for more scenes with the main characters interacting with Jackson and Fede than continuing to pretend to like each other. It’s no wonder why Carey befriends all of Ashley’s lovers while they live in the apartment together.

There are funny instances within the movie (an armful of runaway fish and a rollercoaster) and laugh out loud lines, but it’s not enough to compensate for unlikeable characters. None of the way the people act makes sense in why they’re together in the first place and why they continue to stay together in the end. In Splitsville the characters, especially the male leads, mistake the desire for a deeper intimacy. It’s a movie brimming with misunderstandings in relationships, yet it doesn’t offer a satisfying solution to how the audience can resolve each of the couples’ dilemmas because it would require more introspection than this unreflective glasshouse.