Statistically speaking the cards are stacked against many married couples who swore each other eternal union ever achieving this goal. What fate holds in store for them is a day of separation in the near or distant future. This will cause pain to everyone concerned, the wounds will fester for a long time, and yet one day scars will cover them. There will also be memories of how it all was before that day, and an “afterwards” will take shape. In “Every Other Couple” Mia Halme makes the experience of separation the pivotal point of her biographical observations of broken families. From off screen we hear different stories of what the shared past once meant. We see how the people involved have accommodated themselves emotionally, mentally and socially in the aftermath of the separation.

At the very end of the film a young girl speaks directly into the camera about how she experiences the very first separation in her life. True, the story is far from original. And yet it feels as if a whole cloud of unhappiness was bursting (unfairly, too) over her head. With great empathy, “Every Other Couple” balances between the “on the one hand” and the “on the other hand”.

Ralph Eue