Educational Media Reviews Online

A documentary made over several years is bound to reflect the life changes of its creator, but Kate Schermerhorn’s storyline is particularly poignant. Begun as a search for the definitive secret to a long-lasting marriage, the project resolves into an exploration of its societal and personal complexities.

The filmmaker tells her story and the stories of several couples and experts by alternating between contrasting opinions on what makes a successful marriage. She highlights inconsistencies from couple to couple and expert to expert with insightful humor, allowing their stories to complement her own.

After Happily Ever After is an effective portrait of modern marriage, primarily because it attempts to include a wide variety of models: the arranged marriage, the new marriage, the quick marriage (courtesy of a wedding chapel Elvis), the long-term unmarried relationship, the marriage built on traditional gender roles, the same-sex marriage, the couple that is seldom apart, and the couple that leads independent lives. We meet most couples sitting down, side by side, which provides a visual baseline for all this variety.

Though some promotional material suggests that it discusses alternatives to the western notion of permanent, monogamous marriage, the alternatives it includes are not that far off the beaten path. Even so, Kate Schermerhorn has gathered a wonderfully broad variety of couples which more completely describes modern relationships than other documentaries encountered by this reviewer. After Happily Ever After would be a great addition to courses on family studies, the history of marriage, gender studies, and women's studies.