Movie: The Roses

It seems wrong to write that a film about a marriage break up is great fun but parts of the movie, The Roses, are very funny.

Much of the credit for this must go to its stars Olivia Colman and Benedict Cumberbatch.

At the same time script writer Tony McNamara (the Australian writer who also penned The Favourite and Poor Things) and director Jay Roach (Meet the Parents and Meet the Fockers) should also take a bow for a movie which is also at times sad and distressing.

The Roses tells of the relationships between Ivy (Colman) and Theo (Cumberbatch), who fall madly in love when they first meet but whose marriage slowly unravels under the pressure of modern family dynamics.

When Theo and Ivy meet in London, he is a successful and slightly professionally frustrated architect, and she is earning her stripes in a top-end restaurant.

After a lust-filled encounter in the restaurant, they get married, move to California to find new beginnings and have two kids, Hattie (played by Delaney Quinn and Hala Finley) and Roy (Ollie Robinson and Wells Rappaport).

Life initially seems good. Theo is on the verge of architectural fame with his latest masterpiece, a high-profile nautical museum in San Francisco. To support Ivy, who has spent her time at home raising the children, Theo helps her open a cheekily named seafood restaurant, We’ve Got Crabs.

Then a disastrous storm strikes. Theo’s reputation is literally blown away and he becomes a laughing stock. The same storm sends traffic to Ivy’s struggling restaurant, where a prominent food critic happens to dine. Overnight, with the help of her staff – front-of-house manager Jeffrey (Ncuti Gatwa) and sous chef Jane (Sunita Mani), Ivy becomes a culinary star.

As a result, the couple’s roles in the marriage change.  Instead of staying at home and cooking for her husband and kids, Ivy is now an extremely successful chef and business woman while Theo becomes a stay-at-home dad. The more successful Ivy becomes, the more Theo’s resentment grows.

Their attitudes towards child-rearing is one of many differences. While Ivy used to feed the kids lollies, Theo is all about health and fitness and athletic prowess – so much so that both children win athletic scholarships to Miami aged around 13.

Eventually the resentment Ivy and Theo feel towards each other spirals into all-out emotional and physical warfare.

As the relationship fails so does the tone of the movie which starts as more of a rom com as we follow the first years of the couple’s life, to a very dark, biting piece.

The repartee between Ivy and Theo provides many of the movie’s laughs.  The relationship between the couple and their friends including Barry (Andy Samberg) and Amy (Kate McKinnon) and Rory (Jamie Demetriou) and Sally (Zoë Chao) also has some fun moments.  The interaction between the couples often highlights the difference between English and American language, humour and outlook on life.

It should be said that the support cast is very much that: this movie definitely belongs to Colman and Cumberbatch who expertly demonstrate their dramatic and comic credentials. They dominate all the scenes they are in with one exception – Allison Janney’s very quick scene as Ivy’s divorce lawyer.

The Roses is the second incarnation of a movie based on the 1981 novel by Warren Adler.  The first was the 1989 The War of the Roses starring Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner.

According to director Roach his movie is a reimagining of the 1989 classic, tapping into the raw, often absurd messiness of modern relationships and family with a contemporary lens.

“While the original film is obviously quite brilliant, it is also of its time. We realised this had to be a complete reimagining,” he explained.

“The tone is unique, it’s basically real life.”

For this reason, The Roses may not be the movie for those who are experiencing relationship difficulties.  But for those who appreciate a clever script and the chance to see two great actors in action The Roses ticks many boxes.

* Photo by Jaap Buitendijk courtesy of Searchlight Pictures. © 2025 Searchlight Pictures All Rights Reserved.

The Roses opens in Australian cinemas on Thursday September 4.