Half of all marriages today end in divorce. In Pants on Fire, directed by Rocky Collins, that statistic is maintained. When the film begins, Assistant District Attorney Max Hammer (played by Harry O’Reilly) is married to Julie Hammer (played by Christy Baron), an elementary schoolteacher, and Barry Grogan (played by Neil Maffin), a fellow teacher at the same school, is married to Dierdre Grogan (played by Karen Young), a homemaker who takes care of two adorable younger children. Julie and Barry have been working together to publish a children’s story, a collaboration that carried over into having sex, often immediately after school (even in a schoolroom). Max is running for district attorney; he had an affair with one of his administrative aides, Nicki (played by Arija Bareikis), but he broke off the lovemaking three months earlier so as not to jeopardize his marriage. Both husbands are domineering, and both wives are trying to please their husbands, but serious lovemaking has stopped at home. Max does not want children until after he is elected district attorney, whereas Barry believes that two children are enough. One day during a love tryst Barry insists that Julie must marry him, and he misreads Julie’s hesitation. He then tells his wife Deirdre, who kicks him out of the home. Julie, however, remains ambivalent. When she tells Max about her affair, he insists that she must end the relationship with Barry immediately. But she cannot do so, so she commutes between Barry’s hotel room and home, unable to make a clear decision that will make everyone happy. Dierdre and Barry remain apart, since Barry is committed to marry Julie, while Dierdre is unhappy but does not want Barry back. A marriage counselor enters the scene, making helpful suggestions to Julie and Max, but Max is so eager to be decisive that he explodes with emotion over the ambiguity of the situation, while Julie realizes that all her life she has tried to please men by telling lies, if necessary. The counselor suggests that Max and Julie should sign a contract, vowing to remain in the marriage for three months to see whether the problems can be resolved satisfactorily. The document is drawn up and signed, but Julie continues to be torn between the two men who love her, and Max continues to respond emotionally, even losing his election because of hysterical responses to reporter’s questions on the way to work one day. When he is almost on the verge of creating more equality in the relationship by admitting his affair with Nicki Julie confesses that she is pregnant but does not know the identity of the father, whereupon Max kicks her out. She flees to Barry, but Max follows her to his hotel room, insisting that Barry must know that she is pregnant. Neither man wants another child, but now Julie for the first time articulates what she wants: She wants to be a mother, even if she has no husband, but she would prefer to have Max as her husband. Then Max suggests a new contract, to be signed by all three, that will keep his marriage with Julie intact. They sign. The film then fast forwards to a home with Julie, Max, and a blue-eyed baby girl. Two friends have dropped by to see the baby. One apparently realizes that a blue-eyed baby could not have been born from Julie and Max, who both have black eyes, but decides not to say anything, leaving the two happy parents in ignorance about a sensitive issue. Barry, who has finished collaborating on the children’s book with Julie, is said to have made a down payment on a condo from the publisher’s advance on the book. Happy ending? One marriage was saved, but the other was not. The film’s director, whose father taught political science at a campus of the University of Maine, focuses on the fact that married couples tell each other white lies instead of being honest. But there are further subtexts in Pants on Fire. Men in the film clearly display chauvinistic attitudes, discounting the feelings of their spouses because they do not want to understand them, leaving women without the ability to formulate their own needs. The positive intervention of the marriage counselor is a hint to couples in crisis to take advantage of third party mediation, though often couples do so too late. However, the most unexplored issue is why heterosexual marriage partners place such high store on marital fidelity. Would more marriages and more egos be saved if married men and women provided unconditional love for one another amid the ambiguity of human relationships? MH