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Just watched a DVD called Married in America 2 by Michael Apted, an English filmmaker. This is the second of a series that follows couples through the first 12 years of their marriage. It is like his 7 Up documentary series which is a course of interviews that Apted’s been following every 7 years since the people were, well, 7 years old. I think the latest movie produced is called 49 Up so this series has become a real social commentary.
This new series follows 9 couples. The first movie was filmed in 2001 and this latest one was filmed in 2006. My interest, of course, was to see how Divorce figures in. It really is kept kind of low key. Two of the couples have divorced. It seemed that one couple maybe tried to get back together again for the sake of the film. The other couple, a Biker couple, started their relationship while the husband was in jail so I sort of figured they were picked sort of coldly for the potential that their marriage had to go straight down the tubes. These two couples both suffered serious personal traumas such as Health problems and deaths of relatives in the first years of their marriages. An upwardly mobile Urban New York couple married right before 9/11 dug a whole in what was pretty much their back yard. They are still together.
Only two people interviewed talked about their parents’ divorces which I thought was odd.
It seems that most couples are still in the upwardly mobile phase of their relationships.
What I did notice was the willingness for the Children of D to seek out counseling for their relationship problems because they say they are aware of the problems that their parents’ had. This is funny since most psychologists don’t counsel for issues specific to problems of Children of D. I’ve actually heard two people say that going through their own divorce was the best therapy for getting over their parents’ divorce. Perhaps that’s the only answer.
A lot of subtle problems come up that most of my married friends have gone through. It’s a lot like listening to one’s friends talk about their marriages. Money problems and extra-marital affairs aren’t discussed although it seems that Apted chose some couples purposely to bring up those problems. The people picked have a good film presence and are actually very interesting to watch. It will be interesting to see how many of them survive the 7 year itch.
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Spoiled Children of Divorce 