I read the British chick-lit book I Don't Know How She Does It by Allison Pearson last year just before starting this blog. I really enjoyed it. The story was told in first person by main character Kate Reddy, who has a fantastic voice. She is witty, sarcastic, and very human. I also enjoyed the book for the themes it tackled, namely the issue of parents juggling full time work with full time families. Okay, that is my own broadening of the topic - Pearson specifically zeroes in on working mothers. As a young married woman with a flourishing career, I've given a lot of thought to these issues, though I've reached no real conclusions.This past weekend, I borrowed the movie version of I Don't Know How She Does It from my public library, and was pretty disappointed in it. Granted, I didn't have high hopes to begin with. The movie casts Sarah Jessica Parker as Kate, and she annoys me in everything I've ever seen her in. This movie was no exception.
Immediate disappointment number one was that in the movie, Kate Reddy is an American living in Boston instead of a Brit in London. Her long-distance colleague, Jack Abelhammer, is played by Pierce Brosnan and so has a foreign accent. He's not the epitome of an American businessman like he is in the book, though his office is still in New York.
The movie pits Reddy and Abelhammer physically together far more often than the book, probably because in the book they are on separate continents rather than only a couple hundred miles apart. In the movie, Kate flies to New York at least once a week to work with Jack in person, while in the book, I think they only meet face to face a couple of times. This drastically changes the dynamics between the two characters, of course, and those changed dynamics are reflected in differences in plot.
Book Kate sees Jack more as an abstract fantasy contrasting desperately with her very concrete husband at home (played by the adorable Greg Kinnear in the movie). When they meet in person, it's easier (though not excusable) for book Kate to feel like she's in another reality unrelated to her family. An affair or almost affair (I'm not telling which) in this scenario is complex psychologically and perhaps (perhaps) more understandable.
Movie Kate works with Jack in person every week and so he is just as concrete in her mind as her husband is. An affair in this scenario would be absolutely despicable because it's clear that Kate is in her own reality, her own time zone, etc. and not far removed at all from her family at home. These differences in situation and emotional and physical distance account for the mild makeover the relationship between Jack and Kate gets in the movie compared to the book. I can't say that this made the plot better or worse in the movie than the book, but the book certainly had more depth of emotion and complexity than the movie.
Another disappointment is that Kate's feisty voice in the book does not translate over to the movie. I think this is partially because of the actress playing Kate, but mostly because the movie takes all of the best and snarkiest points out of Kate's mouth and puts them into her friends' documentary-style monologues. One example is that in the movie, Kate's friend tells the camera that when a man leaves work to be with his children, even for something trivial, he is praised as a good family man, a hero of a father. But when a woman leaves work to be with her children, even for something like a serious illness, her coworkers and superiors see her as under dedicated to the company. The point is unfortunately valid, but expressed more strongly in the book when it comes from Kate's own observations and in her unique voice.
In other words, the movie dulled Kate down. Really, the movie dulled down a lot of the plot, too, though telling you exactly how would be spoilage.
The movie is really not that good, but could have been much better considering the fun and insightful book off of which it was based. So, I recommend Pearson's book, but I don't recommend the movie.
