Day 117: What To Expect When You're Expecting

Babies are happening; people are having them, adopting them, and sadly, losing them. Becoming a family is a different experience for each of the couples in the film but it helps them come together.

The couples are all linked in some way and are all getting to grips with their pregnancies. I liked that it wasn’t really all that easy for them and that they fought because then they got to say everything they needed to say and could come together again knowing more than before. They helped each other through the difficult times and it means they’ll be better prepared for the even harder times to come.

Pregnancy seems like such a stressful and uncomfortable time and I’m just in awe of people who do it. And a little scared. Pregnant women scare me, I don’t know why. I remember when my sister was pregnant and my little nephew was kicking away in there and I could feel him kicking. It was the most intense thing I have ever felt, I can’t even really put it into words. There was a tiny person in there and he was making sure we all knew it, especially his mum. Whenever I watched films and saw people feeling the baby kick I never really got it but then when I felt it for myself, it was honestly just the most breathtaking thing. Although I suppose if I was actually pregnant and felt the baby kick it might be more breathtaking but it really was amazing. Anyway, I guess the film has made me think that I want a baby, oh dear.

Right, so I totally thought this film was going to be rubbish, I don’t know why but I really thought it was going to just be boring. But I actually liked it. I mean, I probably wouldn’t watch it again but I wouldn’t avoid it.

7/10

Day 105: Conversations with Other Women

A woman (Helena Bonham Carter) and a man (Aaron Eckhart) get to chatting at a wedding but this isn’t the first time they’ve met, they used to be married when they were younger. They spend the night reminiscing about their past life together and it’s all really rather sad.

To start with we’re supposed to assume that the two don’t know each other but it’s obvious pretty much immediately that they were close before. Just the way they talk to each other and how they are together makes it clear. I liked the playful way they talked and how this night was obviously important to both of them. They go up to her hotel room as we all expected that they would and they spend time comparing how they were before to how they are now; he’s put on weight, she’s got a scar and a shorter haircut. It’s almost as if they don’t want to have sex but they both know that it’s what they need and seems to be the natural progression of the night’s events. So they do have sex but it is sad and, as he later points out, it makes whatever they had seem final. They divorced years before (I think maybe 10?) and the whole time he was hoping that if he met her again then they could get back together but he feels like now it could never happen. He tries to persuade her to leave her husband but she isn’t going to and I think he never really expected her to either.

I wonder how often people who used to be so close meet again at a much later date and come together for a short period. It didn’t seem like a healthy thing in the film. He said that he had imagined them meeting again so many times and he was clearly upset that she wasn’t going to stay. She was conflicted because she didn’t want to betray her husband but she also did want to be close to her ex again. They both seemed to accept the sadness of the situation and that what they'll do is inevitable. It must be difficult to really know what to do in that situation. It doesn’t seem such a black and white thing to me, when anything to do with cheating is usually. I can understand that they’d want to be close again, they loved each other so it’s only natural that those feelings would come into play here. It doesn’t seem like it did either of them any good though, and they did both cheated on their partners. I don’t know what conclusion I’d come to if this was to happen in my life and I’m a bit surprised by that.

The film was great, I was expecting it to be rubbish. I loved the fact that the whole thing was done in split screen, it really added something to it. And I liked that we didn’t know their names, they just come together for a night and get to live within the memory of how they were before and then they go their separate ways. It was interesting and sad, which is always my favourite.

8/10