The Intellectual Horror Show
Most divorce movies try to find a silver lining or at least a moment where the parents put their egos aside for the sake of the kids. This film does the opposite. Set in 1980s Brooklyn, it captures a very specific brand of academic pretension where being "intellectual" is a shield for being a jerk.
The father is the kind of guy who classifies people as "philistines" and treats his children like small, unfinished versions of his own ego. It’s a brilliant performance of a man who is so obsessed with his own failing career that he doesn't realize he’s teaching his older son to be just as insufferable. If you’ve ever known someone who uses their "refined taste" to bully people, this movie will feel like a documentary. It’s sharp, it’s funny in a way that makes you wince, and it’s deeply uncomfortable.
Not a Teaching Tool
Because the movie focuses on two young boys, parents often wonder if it’s something they can watch with their own teenagers to "start a conversation" about family changes. The answer is a hard no.
While there are plenty of movies about divorce for kids that offer a roadmap for healing or resilience, this is a film about the damage that happens when that roadmap is shredded. The behavior here—from the younger son smearing fluids on library books to the older son plagiarizing a Pink Floyd song—is a cry for help that the parents are too self-absorbed to hear.
This isn't a "how-to" for navigating a split; it’s a "how-it-was" for a director processing his own history. For a more tactical breakdown of the specific triggers and sexual content that earned this film its R rating, check out The Squid and the Whale: A Parent’s Guide to Family Fallout.
The Cringe Factor
The film’s power comes from its refusal to look away from the embarrassment of being a kid in a collapsing household. We see the older son, Walt, parroting his father’s opinions on books he hasn't even read, trying desperately to win the approval of a man who doesn't know how to give it.
The "squid and the whale" refers to a diorama at the American Museum of Natural History. It’s a childhood memory that felt terrifying and massive when Walt was little, but as an adult, it’s just a plastic display in a dark room. That’s the movie’s thesis: the things that haunt us as kids are often just the messy, small-scale failures of our parents.
Critics loved this for a reason—the 91% on Rotten Tomatoes is well-earned—but it’s a movie for adults to watch with a glass of wine after the kids are in bed. It’s a masterpiece of the "cringe" genre, but the friction is purely psychological. You’ll laugh, but you’ll also want to give your own kids a hug and promise them you’ll never make them take sides in a tennis match.
