Their boiling argument is too volatile to be conducted safely in the front seat of their automobile, so Frank pulls over, and the two air their bitterness on the side of the road.
It's, well, a titanic spat, and gives Winslet and DiCaprio a chance to prove they're just as good clawing at each other as they are staring dreamily into each other's eyes. The insults are ruthlessly hurled, and deeply felt, even though we barely know them at this early juncture.
I wish I could say things improve, but that is not to be in Sam Mendes' somber adaptation of Richard Yates' classic novel of suburban despair, published in 1961 when the idea of suburban despair was not so well worn.
In Yates' book, the generation of World War II vets who spawned the baby boom was not yet The Greatest Generation. It was, in fact, "the least vital and most terrified in modern times." Exhibit A: Frank Wheeler, who came home from the war with a vague idea about a bohemian life, but instead ends up in a bedroom community, with a paper-pushing job at his father's staid New York firm.
Until recently, the Wheelers haven't taken things seriously. They're a fun, popular couple whom people admire because they view their suburban life with detached amusement. In a memorable scene, a neighbor (Kathy Bates) brings her middle-aged, mentally unstable son (accomplished movie weirdo Michael Shannon) to dine with them, knowing they'll be hip enough to deal with him.
Eventually, though, the Wheelers realize this isn't an ironic phase, it's their life. It's at this moment that we meet them - panicked, unhappy and desperate, until April hatches a wild plan to drop out and move to Paris with their two kids. She'll support them while Frank dusts off his abandoned dreams of thinking, writing, whatever.
