SACHA PFEIFFER, HOST:
Sometimes people do crazy things after a breakup - in the movie world, really crazy, like scrubbing all memory of your ex from your mind, as happened in "Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind"...
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND")
JIM CARREY: (As Joel Barish) It's all falling apart. I'm erasing you, and I'm happy. You did it to me first.
PFEIFFER: ...Or dating an AI bought on the rebound, like in "Her"...
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "HER")
JOAQUIN PHOENIX: (As Theodore) What do I call you? Do you have a name?
SCARLETT JOHANSSON: (As Samantha) Um, yes - Samantha.
PHOENIX: (As Theodore) Really? Where did you get that name from?
JOHANSSON: (As Samantha) I gave it to myself, actually.
PFEIFFER: ...Or ranking your breakups, just to torture yourself, like in "High Fidelity."
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "HIGH FIDELITY")
JOHN CUSACK: (As Rob Gordon) No. 3 in the top five all-time breakup list, Charlie Nicholson.
PFEIFFER: The movies are filled with examples of breakups - tragic ones, epic ones, even absurd ones. And we're going to talk about some of those for our weekly movie conversation. This week, we have Stephen Thompson, cohost of NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour, and ALL THINGS CONSIDERED producer Mia Venkat. Hi to both of you.
MIA VENKAT, BYLINE: Hey, Sacha.
STEPHEN THOMPSON, BYLINE: Hey, Sacha.
PFEIFFER: I first want your takes on why breakups are such rich material for the movies. Why does Hollywood go back to this theme over and over again? Mia, you want to start?
VENKAT: Sure. I mean, it's obvious, right? Like, love is a huge theme in songs and movies, and a common thing that happens when you're in love is falling out of love. And I don't think it has to be a serious relationship. It can be, like, a situationship (ph), someone you went on two dates with.
(LAUGHTER)
VENKAT: You can still relate to the feeling of, like, an end of a time where you felt like you were in love or with someone. And so I think there's something comforting in that when you're watching it, or maybe if you're, like, looking for an answer and why something happened, you can find it in some kind of a film.
PFEIFFER: Stephen?
THOMPSON: Yeah, I think the relatability factor is huge here. I also think anybody who's ever tried to write a story about a relationship will sometimes run into this challenge of, like, how do I create a conflict that they can recover from? Well, a breakup is a natural form of conflict, and so many movies, like, need to have some sort of conflict that gets resolved. Breakups are ripe for that.
PFEIFFER: You know, there are funny breakup movies, and there are heartbreaking ones. Let's talk first about the ones that make us laugh. Do each of you have a favorite?
THOMPSON: I think in terms of comedies about breakups, "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" jumps immediately to mind from 2008.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL")
KRISTEN BELL: (As Sarah Marshall) Peter, as you know, I love you very much.
JASON SEGEL: (As Peter Bretter) Are you breaking up with me?
THOMPSON: That's Jason Segel, Kristen Bell, Mila Kunis. And, you know, you have kind of these indelible scenes, like, where Jason Segel is standing fully frontally nude and sobbing.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL")
SEGEL: (As Peter Bretter) Please don't go.
BELL: (As Sarah Marshall) Why don't you just put on some clothes, and we can sit down and discuss this.
SEGEL: (As Peter Bretter) No, I can't do anything right now.
BELL: (As Sarah Marshall) I'm so sorry, Pete.
THOMPSON: And when you talk about relatability, who among us, right?
(LAUGHTER)
THOMPSON: And, you know, that's one that jumps out to me as kind of getting at something really, you know, I'm going to keep using the word relatable, but I think that's really key to any breakup story. You know, most people who've kind of lived in the world and had a bunch of relationships have seen a bunch of those relationships end. And I think this movie gets at a lot of the pathos in that as it's also getting at a lot of the humor.
VENKAT: I think my answer for this is a little bit funny and heartbreaking, and it's the movie "Twilight," specifically in the sequel "New Moon." The scene where she is getting broken up with, like, it's funny because the entire premise of it is ridiculous. Like, he's a 400-something-year-old vampire, and he's like, you know, this is not going to work.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE TWILIGHT SAGA: NEW MOON")
ROBERT PATTINSON: (As Edward Cullen) You just don't belong in my world, Bella.
KRISTEN STEWART: (As Bella Swan) I belong with you.
PATTINSON: (As Edward Cullen) No.
VENKAT: It goes into this montage of her, like, depression after this breakup, and the screen just goes like, month by month of, like, everything in our world is, like, the same because it's all a blur 'cause he's out of her life now.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE TWILIGHT SAGA: NEW MOON")
STEWART: (As Bella Swan) The absence with him is everywhere I look.
VENKAT: I think it's funny because it's, like, so ridiculous. But it also is, like, OK, she's 17, and that is what a heartbreak feels like when you're in high school. And so it's...
PFEIFFER: It's over - your life.
VENKAT: Yeah. Even though it's, like, funny to me 'cause it's like, all right, let's get it together, Bella...
(LAUGHTER)
VENKAT: ...It is kind of relatable.
PFEIFFER: Yeah. I mean, when you're an adolescent and this happens, it rocks your world...
VENKAT: Yeah.
PFEIFFER: ...You know?
THOMPSON: Well, yeah, an adolescent being dumped by an older vampire...
VENKAT: Exactly.
THOMPSON: ...Who among us - again?
VENKAT: Who among us?
(LAUGHTER)
PFEIFFER: You know "Better Off Dead," the John Cusack movie? I have lost track of the times my husband quotes something from that movie about it being funny. But it is a breakup movie. I mean, the title "Better Off Dead," that's how he feels after he loses the girl.
THOMPSON: (Laughter).
VENKAT: Yeah.
PFEIFFER: How often do you think people actually go to breakup movies to get over breakups?
VENKAT: I think more often than you would think. I think that, like, there is something to, when you're feeling very sad and you're like, I just want to sit in it, and I want to cry. And it, like, kind of takes you out of your own relationship or your own breakup in that moment and dive into someone else's. But I think it's pretty cathartic in that, like, when you're going through it already to, like, watch someone else go through it and just get to be sad about it.
THOMPSON: Yeah, I mean, I'm definitely an escapist man. You know, when I went through a divorce about 15 years ago, it was around the time that the movie "Blue Valentine" came out with Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "BLUE VALENTINE")
RYAN GOSLING: (As Dean) You can call me stupid.
MICHELLE WILLIAMS: (As Cindy) I'm so out of love with you. I've got nothing left for you - nothing, nothing.
THOMPSON: And I remember thinking, like, I would rather do absolutely anything on Earth than go to this movie.
PFEIFFER: (Laughter).
THOMPSON: I will - I would much, much, much rather watch basically anything else, but certainly, like, comedy, give me cartoons, give me reality TV, give me anything but, you know, watching two people go through this emotional torture. See, also, the movie "Marriage Story," which I think is terrific. But I couldn't imagine watching that while I was in the heat of a breakup.
PFEIFFER: That's a great point. I was going to ask you about that there are also dark breakup movies, and I wonder why they attract audiences at all. I mean, that "Marriage Story" scene where Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson are vicious to each other.
VENKAT: Yeah. What does he say, like, every day I wake up, and I wish you were dead?
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "MARRIAGE STORY")
ADAM DRIVER: (As Charlie Barber) I wake up and I hope you're dead. Dead - like, if I could guarantee Henry would be OK, I'd hope you would get an illness and then get hit by a car and die.
PFEIFFER: Why would people want to watch that?
THOMPSON: I mean, why do people watch horror movies, you know? Like, I don't want to be brutally murdered, and yet, you know, I'll watch, you know, any number of pretty, famous people, you know, simulate it. I think part of it is a certain amount of, like, it puts things in perspective, like as, you know, bad as this is, I'm not Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson in "Marriage Story."
PFEIFFER: Is there one breakup movie you'd recommend to a friend going through a breakup, or would the recommendation change depending on the circumstances of your friend's breakup?
THOMPSON: (Laughter) Oh, that's an interesting one because, like, it depends on where they are in the breakup - right? - because if it's fresh and you're raw, and everything reminds you of, you know, this person, and you're just trying to help them pass the time until the wounds have healed a little bit, then I'd be like, oh, you know what? Watch "A Bug's Life."
(LAUGHTER)
THOMPSON: It has absolutely nothing to do with relationships. But if it's somebody who's, you know, kind of been in it longer or needs help getting perspective, you know, I would direct them to, you know, one of my favorite not only breakup movies, but one of my favorite movies, period, "Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind." You played a clip from it at the top of this segment.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND")
KATE WINSLET: (As Clementine Kruczynski) What if you stayed this time?
CARREY: (As Joel Barish) I walked out the door. There's no memory left.
WINSLET: (As Clementine Kruczynski) Come back and make up a goodbye, at least. Let's pretend we had one.
THOMPSON: That film isn't just about this doomed and frustrating relationship. It's about the perils of forgetting your pain. You know, if you're looking for an escape from your pain to the point where you are willing to erase a person from your memory, you're never going to learn from the mistakes that you made in the relationship. And to me, my favorite kind of breakup movie is where people come out of it a changed person, where people come out of it, like, I need to look back on this relationship as a cocktail of good and bad and not think I wasted all those years of my life just because this didn't end a certain way. I think that's a really important way to look at relationships and all sorts of other, you know, areas of your life.
PFEIFFER: Mia, do you have one for that?
VENKAT: My favorite breakup movie that's more recent is "Someone Great." It's on Netflix. It came out in 2019. It stars Gina Rodriguez and Lakit Stanfield.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "SOMEONE GREAT")
GINA RODRIGUEZ: (As Jenny Young) I'm moving to San Francisco because I got my dream job - career girl over here, doing the d*** thing.
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As character) OK.
RODRIGUEZ: (As Jenny Young) Getting it done, you know?
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As character) OK, yeah. That's what's up (ph).
RODRIGUEZ: (As Jenny Young) And he just didn't want to do long distance.
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As character) Wow.
RODRIGUEZ: (As Jenny Young) I know.
VENKAT: I would recommend this one just because especially for, I don't know, folks around my age, it feels like a great representation of a modern breakup. Like, it starts off with a montage to Lorde's "Supercut," where she's just playing gorgeous flashbacks of their memories together, which feels very relatable. And it shows a really beautiful representation of what role your friends play in your life when you're going through a breakup, and I think it's a good example of, like, a movie of finding yourself or doing what's right for you even when the relationship was gorgeous.
PFEIFFER: That's NPR's Stephen Thompson and Mia Venkat. Thank you very much.
VENKAT: Thank you, Sacha.
THOMPSON: Thank you, Sacha.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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