The Roses

The film opens in a therapist’s office, where Theo (Benedict Cumberbatch) and Ivy Rose (Olivia Colman) are in couples counseling. The therapist, Janice (Belinda Bromilow), assigns them to write ten positive things about each other, but they instead list off a series of passive-aggressive barbs against each other. Janice thinks they are hopeless as a couple, while Theo and Ivy laugh her off before leaving. A flashback shows the day the two of them met. Theo, an architect, is at a restaurant in London with his associates but is becoming overwhelmed. He goes into the kitchen where Ivy is working as a chef. After some flirtation, she lets him try the fish that she was preparing, which he says is delicious. Ivy mentions her plans to move her cooking aspirations to America, and Theo suggests they move together. They then proceed to have sex in the freezer. Ten years later, Theo and Ivy are married with two children, Hattie and Roy (Delaney Quinn and Ollie Robinson), living in California. Theo is getting ready for the opening of a maritime museum that he helped design, which has some concerns over the sail he decided to include on the boat model that’s on the roof. Ivy has been a stay-at-home mom who spoils the kids with sweet treats, something that Theo is concerned about. Theo shows Ivy a piece of property that he surprises her with so that she can open her new restaurant, a seafood spot that she names “We’ve Got Crabs!” She hires a sous chef, Jane (Sunita Mani), and a waiter, Jeffrey (Ncuti Gatwa). The Roses later meet with their couple friends, Barry and Amy (Andy Samberg and Kate McKinnon) & Sally and Rory (Zoe Chao and Jamie Demetriou), at a shooting range. The couples are typically against guns

but are trying them out anyway. They all go back to Barry and Amy’s home for dinner, where things get uncomfortable as Rory makes a comment on the design of Theo’s museum. Ivy helps him come up with an excuse so they can bail and go home. Later on, Theo and Barry are out for drinks across the street from the museum, just as a massive storm starts to hit. At the restaurant, Ivy is stoned and nervous when more customers start pouring in to seek shelter, including a noted food critic, Sylvia (Caroline Partridge). She calls Theo, but he convinces her to be calm and do what she can. The storm intensifies, and the sail on the boat model starts to come down. People start to record the scene, which Theo tries to downplay, but the entire ship comes down, collapsing the whole roof of the museum. While Theo is humiliated after a video of him during the collapse goes viral, Ivy’s restaurant gets a glowing review from Sylvia, leading to a rise in customers. Theo goes to take Hattie and Roy to the restaurant for lunch, only to get a phone call informing him he’s out of a job. He pulls over and has a mild breakdown in front of the kids. When they get to the restaurant, Theo explains his situation to Ivy, and she suggests that she can be the breadwinner while he is a stay-at-home dad until he gets back on his feet. Ivy’s business picks up, leading to her hiring more staff (although she catches Jane having sex with one of them). Theo keeps Hattie and Roy off sugar and makes them sign contracts to agree to this, as well as making them exercise more. While Ivy’s success has grown, Theo has grown clearly

resentful, something that friends like Barry and Amy can see (which Amy uses as an attempt to proposition Theo…in front of Barry). In an attempt to patch things up, Theo and Ivy start seeing Janice and later take a trip to New York City. Things quickly hit their first bump when Theo sees Sally on the flight while Ivy is asleep, and Sally bringing up the museum collapse puts Theo on edge enough for him to start drinking. By the time they’ve landed, Theo is roaring drunk and throwing the plane’s garbage around because the stewardess threw out a napkin with one of his drawings on it. He spends much of his time at the hotel hungover, while Ivy goes out on her own and later gets drunk herself. She blames herself for Theo’s resentment, but later encourages him to get to work on building a dream house that he has wanted to work on. Over the next three years, Ivy’s business is able to expand and open more locations across California, while Theo has almost managed to complete the dream house. Hattie and Roy (now played by Hala Finley and Wells Rappaport) are set to attend the University of Miami on sports scholarships. By this point, the Roses are still hostile towards one another. When Theo irritates Ivy over questions regarding the house, she eats a raspberry, knowing she will go into anaphylactic shock until Theo sticks her with an EpiPen. Later, she goes on a run with Theo and the kids, and is upset to learn that Hattie went to Theo instead of her when she got her first period. The kids are sent off to college, and the house is finally complete. The Roses invite Barry, Amy, Sally, Rory, Jeffrey, and Jane over for a housewarming dinner.

Before they even sit down to eat, Theo and Ivy get on edge over comments regarding things in the house, like them shelling out for Ivy to have a stove that belonged to Julia Child. During the dinner, the two exchange crass comments towards one another, which the guests interpret as witty banter and leads to Sally and Rory trying, but it’s just Sally saying mean things to Rory. Eventually, Ivy snaps and plays death metal over the smart home system (HAL) and then tosses cake at the guests in a huff. After everyone has left, the two have an argument over their mutual resentment. The next day, Theo goes for a run and finds a beached whale on the shore. He stops a few drivers to help him push the creature back into the ocean. When he returns home, Theo tells Ivy about the experience and the emotions he has felt, which excites Ivy, until Theo admits it brought him to the realization that he is no longer happy in their marriage and that he wants a divorce. Theo hires Barry as his lawyer while Ivy hires Eleanor (Allison Janney). Ivy is intent on getting the house and letting Theo walk away with a certain amount of money, but Theo refuses to give her anything in the divorce. The two have fully devolved into childish bickering and are now officially at war. Hattie and Roy even contact them and support them in their divorce since they figured it was always going to turn out this way. Theo starts retaliating by burning Ivy’s prized cookbooks. Ivy responds by throwing two live crabs into the tub while he is in it. Theo later locks Ivy in her bedroom with HAL playing polka on a loop at full volume, promising to turn

it off if she signs an agreement to give him the house, but she burns the papers. He later cancels a bunch of fish orders for the restaurant and orders junk for Ivy. She creates an AI video of Theo smoking crack and saying he deliberately designed something that would collapse. He one-ups her by posting a video where he grates a wart on his foot onto the food at the restaurant, as well as having slipped psychedelic mushrooms into the dishes. Theo gets blacklisted from every architecture firm while Ivy’s restaurant is closed down for a health inspection. Theo gives her a piece of cake containing raspberries, forcing her to choke until she signs the papers to give him the house so he can stick her with an EpiPen. She signs it and he sticks her, but Ivy signed the papers with “Zendaya”. Theo goes to destroy Ivy’s stove, and she returns with a gun and starts firing at him. After chasing each other, Theo and Ivy eventually give up and admit that they never wanted a divorce and that they still love each other. Just as the two are settling down, a gas leak from the broken stove starts to spread through their house. Unaware of what’s about to happen, Theo tells HAL to play music and start a fire. Then there is a white flash… Related Movies: *CUT TO THE CHASE*Brought to you by Theo and Ivy Rose start off as a happy couple with two children, Hattie and Roy. In their 10th year of marriage, Ivy finds success in opening up a seafood restaurant, while Theo's career as an architect hits a huge bump when the museum he helped designed collapses during a storm due to an unnecessary boat model that Theo added to the roof.

While Ivy's business thrives, Theo begins to feel resentment for his wife's success. He becomes a stay-at-home dad and forces the kids to be healthier, making Ivy feeling left out of their lives. Attempts to patch up their marriage fail due to the Roses' shared egos. They make one last attempt to save their marriage when Ivy gives Theo money to help build a dream house for them. After three years, the kids go to college and the house is built, but Theo and Ivy have only grown more bitter and resentful towards one another, culminating in Ivy snapping at Theo in front of their friends during a dinner party. After Theo helps save a beached whale, he realizes he no longer loves Ivy and wants a divorce. The Roses get into an ugly divorce battle since Ivy demands the house, but Theo wants to give her nothing. They start to act against each other, like Theo sabotaging Ivy's restaurant and her getting him blacklisted from other architecture firms, leading to Theo destroying Ivy's kitchen stove and her trying to shoot him with a gun. Eventually, they tire out and admit they never wanted any of this. Just as they start to reconcile, a gas leak from the stove spreads through the house, and Theo tells the smart home system to light a fire, killing both of them in an explosion.