A marriage of inconvenience

Navnee Likhi

Swedish director Bjorn Runge's drama, The Wife, is based on best-selling novel of the same name by Meg Wolitzer. The story centres around Joan Castleman, who sacrificed her talent for writing for her novelist husband, Joe castleman. Joan ignores Joe’s infidelities and his cover up excuses because of his talent for writing. Joan is a disciplined wife who takes care of Joe's routine needs yet sometimes seems less than eager to play a silent, smiling wife. Joe is a tough man to deal and is too eager to bask alone in the glow of his recognition as a successful writer.

The Wife is a poignant, emotional journey of a woman, who faces late-life crisis in her married life. The film brings out her pent up emotions in this suffocating relationship. The narrative moves slowly.

The film opens in 1992 in Connecticut showing Joe and Joan at their residence. Joe has been selected for the Nobel Prize in Literature and is waiting, along with his wife, for an early morning call from the Nobel Prize committee in Sweden. The phone rings and Joe is informed that he has won the Nobel Prize for literature. Both Joe and Joan are excited on hearing the news but as Joe approaches Joan to thank her for her support in his literary career, she flinches and moves away. As the news spreads, the couple is invited to parties. Joe tells his admirers, “My wife does not write, thank lord for that — if she were to write, I would suffer a writer’s block.” Joan looks on. The comment hurt her but it appears this was part of the life she had chosen to live. An easy exit from marriage does not seem possible. There is much more to their story. There are flashbacks of the 1950s, which show Joan as a star student of a creative writing class in a college taught by professor Joe Castleman, a budding novelist. Joan gives up her ambitious plan of becoming a writer as she senses the threat that her talent poses to the fragile self-esteem of the man she loves. 

Soon Joe, Joan, along with their elder son David, leave for Stockholm for a week of ceremonies before the Nobel Prize. David is a struggling writer and is waiting to seek his father's approval of his first story but Joe is too distracted to read his son's work. David isn't keen on living in his father's shadow for long. The family is trailed by a freelancer biographer Nathaniel Bone who is doing research on Joe’s life and work. On his insistence, Joan agrees to meet him and she mostly sits there listening and she hides more than she reveals. Nathaniel tells Joan that he had come across some beautiful pieces written by her and is curious to know why her husband did not encourage her to write. To this, she says, “I am not a victim, and it is more interesting than that”. 

Professional conceits intervene and escalate the marital tension between them. As they land in Stockholm and head for the Nobel Prize ceremony, the secrets of their married life are dangerously close to becoming public. During the award ceremony, one can find something simmering beneath Joan’s supportive behaviour. Joe’s clandestine affairs and his lack of attention towards the family adds fuel to the fire. In  one of the scenes, Joe is whisked away to interact with intellectuals and Joan is advised by organisers to go shopping or visit spa. Then, at a party organised by the committee, Joan finds Joe flirting with a committee photographer. Joan finally says, “I can’t do it anymore, I can’t take the humiliation.” 

Director Bjorn Runge’s direction is even and clear. David’s desperate quest for his father’s approval for his first written story is slightly overplayed. The story adapted by screenplay writer James Anderson makes a valid point that choices men and women make for themselves in marriage may or may not work.

Glenn Close in the role of Joan Castleman offers laudable performance. Jonathan Pryce plays the role of Joe Castleman as a literary man with gusto.