The Dish & the Spoon

Plot

Rose (Greta Gerwig), in a depressive episode after being cheated on by her husband (Adam Rottenberg), drives far from home to isolate herself at a boarded-up beach town in Delaware on a cloudy fall day. She spends all her cash on beer, and runs into a comatose boy (Olly Alexander), atop a desolate lighthouse. Rose first tries to get him to a hospital, but he awakens and refuses, so they go to a cafe, where he reveals has been dumped by a girl he had traveled from England to be with. Rose offers to take him somewhere, but the boy says he has nowhere to go.

Rose drags the boy along as she looks to confront her former friend Emma (Eleonore Hendricks), for sleeping with her husband. They first go to Emma's house, where Rose yells to be let in, but no one is home. The boy watches Rose loudly berate Emma to the neighbors, before trashing her porch.

They then go to the beer bottling plant where Emma works, but are told she no longer works there. They join a tour group for the factory, and use the opportunity to steal beer and get drunk. While hiding under machinery, the boy asks Rose what she would do if she were to find Emma. Using her lipstick to draw on the machinery, Rose and the boy play a game of hangman, where Rose's answer is revealed to be "Kill The Bitch."

The two then go to Rose's parents' summer house, where Rose secretly steals cash from the boy's wallet. Rose leaves the boy for a day while she awaits Emma at her home, without success. While alone, the boy plays piano. Rose returns home with beer and a pizza (bought with the stolen money), which the two eat before falling asleep on the floor next to the fireplace.

They generally display different responses to their experience of being jilted, Rose often shouting fiercely at or about her husband and his lover, while the boy is more lost and subdued. But one phone call to her husband begins with Rose screaming insults at him, but then listening attentively to something to which she responds only with an occasional and solemn "yes." Later she calls him again, leaving an apparently friendlier message, but continues to stay with the boy at the beach house.

Roses initiates a role-play scenario with the boy, and dresses him up as a woman so she can play the part of the macho male. They role-play going on a date at a restaurant, where Rose kisses him. The boy breaks character and tells her to stop, which angers her. Rose then abandons the boy at the restaurant and goes on a saddening walk around town. Feeling guilty, she returns to the restaurant hours later to find the whole restaurant singing along as the boy plays piano, entertaining them all. Rose apologizes to him and he accepts.

The next day, Rose and the boy find Emma's new place of work, but she isn't there. The boy finds out from a coworker that Emma will be attending a victorian-era dance group later that week. The boy and Rose sneak into the building where the dance will be, and he plays piano for Rose to dance to. The two plan on attending the dance, but the boy does not tell Rose that Emma will be there (perhaps because he doesn't want to feed her desire for revenge).

They spend the following morning on a fishing boat, catching a large fish. That night they share a genuine kiss, and the boy says he would like to marry her and have children; Rose suggests they have ten who look like him, so she has "ten of you" but none who look like her. The next day they have a vintage photo taken of them in wedding clothes, then finishing their dream relationship by showing him her future burial plot. The two attend the dance together, and tell others that they are husband and wife. When Rose sees Emma, she physically assaults her and chases her into a kitchen. The boy follows them and finds an enraged Rose attempting to strangle Emma to death. After catching the boy's eye, Rose lets Emma go, and breaks down wailing into tears.

Rose offers to drive the boy to the airport so he can go back to England, but the boy asks to meet Rose's husband. The two drive away from the beach town. Rose returns to her house and embraces her husband silently, having forgiven him. The boy finally releases some rage by pushing her husband to the ground, after which the husband and Rose go inside and make up. Meanwhile, the boy collapses to the ground, seemingly from jealousy.

When Rose comes back outside, the boy is gone and has left her a wrapped present. Rose sits with the present as the boy walks off alone, marking the end of their connection with each other.

Cast

Greta Gerwig as Rose

Olly Alexander as Boy

Eleonore Hendricks as Emma

Amy Seimetz as Emma's Friend

Adam Rothenberg as Rose's Husband

Dan Seely as the Cashier

Sam Calagione as the Brewery Manager

H.D. Parsons as the Fisherman

Reception

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 64% of 14 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 6.2/10.