R | 1h 38m | Comedy, Drama, Romance | 2025
“Ex-Husbands,” director Noah Pritzker’s midlife-crisis comedy about four middle-class men—a grandfather, father, two sons—and their various relationship woes, is middling, and reminiscent of mid-1990s Billy Crystal movies.
The dad, Peter Pearce (Griffin Dunne), is a New York dentist who, despite his age, sports the best head of hair in the movie. He’s first seen attempting to dissuade his elderly father Simon (Richard Benjamin) from divorcing his mom.
He’s shocked by his dad Simon’s cuckoo obsession with finding one last true love. Simon’s feeling spry—he’s already ditched his wedding ring. He feels he’s got at least 25 more good years. Peter: “You’ll be 110!”
Meanwhile, Peter’s eldest son Nick (James Norton) is experiencing a cigarette-break meet-cute with restaurant co-worker Thea (Rachel Zeiger-Haag).
Six Years Later
Dad Peter’s now got no ring on his finger, and he’s decorating a new bachelor pad. He’s out on his ear at the behest of his wife (Rosanna Arquette). Simon’s intended lengthy period of late-bloomer skirt-chasing has developed into dementia, and Nick is about to get hitched with Thea.
Nick’s headed to his bachelor party in Tulum, Mexico, along with his younger brother Mickey (Miles Heizer) and some old college bros. A major coincidence occurs—his dad ends up on the same jet as his sons, going to the same place. He needs a vacation since he’s depressed about having to sign divorce papers.
Unfortunately Not Woody Allen
Chain-smoking, 30-year-old, still-waiting-tables, depressive wastrel Nick is so convincing that his Debbie-Downer performance unintentionally snuffs out 90 percent of the movie’s intended lighthearted comedy. It’s like Scrooge snuffing out the flame of the Ghost of Christmas Past.Sporting an AM radio soundtrack and a script that avoids conflict until the last act, “Ex-Husbands” is risk-averse. Instead, it opts for trite discourse and homespun domestic philosophies. It’s a comedy of generational romantic malaise that manages to charm only in tiny ways. However, they’re all squelched by the tangible depression felt by the collective Pearce men.
The contrived, everybody-ends-up-in-Tulum plot machination aside, there are no more surprising coincidences as the family attempt to have a pleasant, uneventful time together. Peter has a promising date, but, harsh as it may sound, you may find you don’t particularly care when the middle-aged dentist, whose wife is divorcing him, gets further turned down by a woman he asks to join him for the (alleged) upcoming wedding of his eldest son. A wedding, that, as you can probably imagine, might not happen anyway.
Lastly, there’s a joke about severing one of granddad’s hands, which goes against his will and request to be cremated. Why? So the aggrieved Peter can place it in the mausoleum alongside his mother’s remains. I love a good joke, but this was all just sad and a tad macabre.
