Despite what the movies may want us to think, heartbreak is neither neat nor easy to endure – it’s a harrowing process that causes us to feel as if we have had our entire existence shaken, forced to confront the fact that life is not always particularly happy and that there are many unexpected surprises lurking around the corner that can cause us to feel as if we are at our lowest. However, once these initial feelings subside, we discover that we are stronger than we initially imagined, capable of resolve and resilience that we may have not known existed. Few films demonstrate this process between than Richard LaGravenese and his charming directorial debut Living Out Loud, in which he tells the story of Judith Moore, a middle-aged New York who has her entire life upended after her husband not only reveals that he has been having a long-term affair, but that he is choosing his young mistress over his longtime wife, causing her to be plunged into a state of complete psychological disrepair, wandering the streets of the city she has known so well and seeing it with seemingly a fresh perspective, albeit one that is accompanied by a feeling of deep pain. A truly lovely, heartfelt comedy with sincere dramatic interludes, the film is a fantastic examination of grief, not the intense one that comes with the death of a loved one, but rather the end of a relationship, something that can be extremely harrowing and challenging, even for the strongest of individuals. Simple in theory, provocative in execution and utterly exquisite in how it views certain subjects with an honesty that we don’t often find in more formulaic films of this nature, Living Out Loud is an absolute triumph in both narrative and how its ideas are manifested, leading to quite an astonishing work of deep humanity, handcrafted by an artist who has dedicated a lot of his career to pursuing these kinds of simple stories and rendering them as extremely meaningful fragments of a wider set of stories that ultimately serve to pay tribute to the human condition as a whole.

When dealing with a subject that is supposedly drawn from the universal set of human experiences, a filmmaker needs to find a new perspective from which to approach a story, or else risk it being hopelessly predictable and slightly boring, which is something that we see happening far too often, especially when it comes to the subject of romance, or the aftermath of it falling apart, which is the foundation on which Living Out Loud is built. LaGravenese has shown himself to not be the most original voice, but rather someone whose screenplays and directorial endeavours are formed from a sense of consistency more than anything else, which is a valid and admirable pursuit that makes them very reliable, but not always entirely inventive or memorable. Instead, what helps these stories linger with us are the small details, both narrative and conceptual, that we find liberally scattered throughout the film. In the case of this story, we have a woman who finds herself getting lost in her fantasies – there are several moments in which she discusses life with someone, whether a close friend or a complete stranger, each one revealing a deeper, more profound aspect of her soul, only for it to be revealed to be in her imagination, an ideal conversation that gives her the answers, despite it coming from within. The film is based around the idea of self-reflection and healing through introspection – any good therapist will tell you that they don’t have the solutions we seek, but rather their job is to help us unearth the answers ourselves, which we have embedded in our own sub-conscious, hiding it under layers of trauma and insecurity – and for many of us, it’s only through the challenges that come with something like heartbreak that we start to uncover these ideas, which could be part of some cosmic plan to help us heal, or just a by-product of our emotional vulnerability, which allows us more space and time to reflect and think about our journey to this particular point. These are all the concepts that LaGravenese weaves seamlessly into the theoretical hems of Living Out Loud, which is a fascinating assemblage of terrific ideas that all work together in tandem to create something extremely special.

LaGravenese had the opportunity to choose just about any actor to appear in Living Out Loud, since this may have been his debut as a director, but he had been working as a writer for years, forming strong connections and having his dialogue delivered by the likes of Meryl Streep, Jeff Bridges and Barbra Streisand, coincidentally in some of their finest work as actors. He settled on someone who has never been underpraised as an actor, but is always worthy of being the subject of conversation, as well as a cast of terrific performers who do well playing across from her. Holly Hunter is one of the most gifted actors to work in the medium, her versatility as a performer being matched only by her willingness to bare her soul in some harrowing and challenging material, pushing herself to her emotional limit with incredible dedication and forthright honesty. Living Out Loud contains some of her best work, at least in terms of the extent to which she goes to plumb the emotional depths of this character – Judith is a challenging woman who has experienced so much heartbreak, and finds herself on the edge of her sanity after her husband leaves her. However, rather than give into the impulse to surrender to her depressive state, she decides to improve herself, in the hopes that healing will come about as a result. Her journey brings her into contact with a classy nightclub singer who is battling her own demons, as played by Queen Latifah in a magnificent performance that proves her incredible skill long before she was a popular figure, and the mild-mannered elevator operator whose shroud of social invisibility is broken when he comes into contact with our protagonist, who sees him as a person going through his own struggle. The trio is exceptional and delivers such spirited performances that feel genuine and complex, while also being very funny at the same time, an important aspect that drives this film and makes it so incredibly entertaining and heartfelt in equal measure.

Ultimately, all the aspects that make Living Out Loud so special can be condensed to the very simple fact that LaGravenese approaches these ideas with maturity and honesty, refusing to play into conventions in a cliched way – there is a lot of tradition embedded in this film, but that didn’t preclude it from being captivating in its own right. We often find that the most intriguing aspects of this film come when it is allowed to be slightly abstract, showing the main character’s journey to self-realization in increasingly creative ways. Whether it is a playful imagined suicide (that also takes out her ex-husband and his morally-ambiguous new partner), or a gorgeous sequence set in a New York club where our hero undergoes the extraordinary catharsis that comes from music, performing a synchronized dance with a group of other individuals in which we can quite literally feel the trauma beginning to heal, there is a lot of complexity in how the film constructs its characters that exceed even beyond what the actors are doing, and instead becomes a situation where performance and concept come together in a perfectly chaotic collision, the slight absurdity adding depth and nuance to a film that is most invigorating when it goes in pursuit of something far more captivating than the surface-level humour we may expect from such a story. It adds so much extraordinary charm to this film, which is a masterful character study about the trials and tribulations of a newly-single individual who is given a new lease on life, and where the rebound is worth all the work it takes, since in the process of falling out of love with another person, she learns how to love herself, which is a far more enthralling experience.

Living Out Loud isa fascinating and detailed examination of the psychological state of an ordinary person going through a conventional break-up – in theory, it doesn’t offer anything we haven’t seen before, and it adheres very close to the rulebook in terms of how these stories are told. However, we soon learn a valuable lesson with this film – it isn’t the big moments that matter, but the small details,  and that even the most conventional of stories can be extremely resonant and beautiful when they are told well, which is what makes this film in particular so interesting. LaGravenese is not a name that inspires a lot of excitement, but rather a sense of reliability – the dialogue will likely be slightly overwrought and very much built on a foundation of drawing from common conventions – and this film doesn’t change this formula at all, perhaps even openly pandering to it in a way that is not entirely original but at least consistent with its values. However, all of this comes from looking at the film holistically as a comedy – if we break it down to the individual components, we find that Living Out Loud is so much more than we initially expected, purely based on how it handles some of the trickier material, such as how it views its main character and her journey towards healing herself after being left by her husband – is a common concept and one that this film doesn’t change or challenge in any significant way. But yet, its intricate, deeply human moments keep it afloat, turning this conventional story into an explosive, earnest and raw celebration of life and love, filled with vibrant charm and the most genuine kind of humour, which reminds us of the candour that is possible when a story is told by someone truly dedicated to its premise. Heartfelt, funny and meaningful, Living Out Loud is one of the most moving films of the 1990s, particularly because of its deeply captivating sense of wanting to represent the human condition in its purest form: imperfect and unstable, but yet still worth celebrating, since life is a journey that is unpredictable and filled with obstacles, and the only way to endure these challenges is to simply embrace them one by one until we find true happiness, which we usually discover has been within us all along.