You Hurt Me Feelings Movie Review

As an artist, the people we want to please most are not the producers or agents that can bring our work to the public. It is the ones we love the most: our spouses/partners, children, siblings, parents, etc.

In the new movie, You Hurt Me Feelings, Beth (Julia-Louis Dreyfus) and Don (Tobias Menzies) have been happily married for decades. Beth is a writer and Don is a therapist. After having moderate success with her memoir, she is working on her next book. After showing multiple drafts to her husband, Beth has been told that he likes what he has been reading so far.

Then she finds out that he has not been truthful in his remarks. Turning to her interior designer sister, Sarah (Michaela Watkins), Beth is looking for the support her husband is not giving her. Sarah has her own problems. Her spouse, Mark (Arian Moayed) is an actor who is on the brink of finally making it.

I liked this movie. There is a quiet honesty about relationships and the little white lies we tell our loved ones in order to not cause an emotional chasm. There is also the ego of the artist who craves that approval.

The actor I was most surprised by is Menzies. Hearing his American accent and seeing how he played Don gave me a new appreciation for his abilities as a performer.

Do I recommend it? Yes.

You Hurt Me Feelings is presently in theaters.

Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole Book Review

As much as we love to get everything we want when want it, the truth is that life does not work that way. Time passes in the blink of an eye, certain opportunities never come to fruition, and we make choices not knowing the outcome.

Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole, by Susan Cain was published last year. In this follow-up book to her 2012 bestseller, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, Cain dives into the idea that recognizing the imperfections of being alive is not a bad thing.

Basing her theory on various religious traditions, artistic experiences, and scientific research, her conclusion is that we must embrace the bittersweet experience that is life. If we fail to do so, we continue to allow unnecessary suffering that may change the world for the worse.

I read Quiet about a decade ago and I was blown away. By recognizing the power of being an introvert, Cain breaks the idea that the loudest person in the room always has the best or brightest ideas.

I liked this book, but I was not able to plumb the depths as much as I did with its predecessor. Cain makes excellent points, but it did not hit me the same way.

Do I recommend it? Maybe.

Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Makes Us Whole is available wherever books are sold.