The Other Woman 2011

Emilia Greenleaf’s (Natalie Portman) life is turned upside down when she gets pregnant with a married man’s baby. The man is a Senior Partner at a law firm, Jack Woolf (Scott Cohen) where Emilia has started as an associate. Jack notices Emilia at his office party at home where Emilia also meets Jack’s wife Carolyn (Lisa Kudrow). Jack starts booking projects where he gets to work with Emilia out of town. They start having sex almost immediately & Emilia falls pregnant.

After a quick divorce and a quick wedding, it is revealed through a series of flashbacks that her baby girl died of SIDS. Emilia thinks that Isabel died in her arms when Emilia went to sleep while Isabel was feeding.

Grieving the loss of her infant daughter Isabel, she is still coming to terms with her status as the second wife of lawyer Jack Woolf. Vilified as a homewrecker, she attracts the unyielding ire of his embittered ex-wife Carolyn, who is revealed to also be pregnant. Emilia views this loss as a punishment and cannot move on with her life by having more children after finding out she is sterile.

After Carolyn heard about Emilia’s pregnancy, she realized that she too wanted another child. Carolyn influences her son William (Charlie Tahan) at every turn & uses every available opportunity to highlight mistakes made by Emilia. She even blames Emilia when William fails his interviews to shift from a public school to a private school.

Emilia thinks that this is purely out of spite. Now she must come to terms with her stepson, William, who upsets her with constant references to her dead baby. For e.g. William would make a long conversation with Emilia to convince her to sell the old baby stuff that she no longer needs, on eBay. William would say outrageous things like under the terms of Hebrew law, Isabel did not live long enough to be considered a full human being. Emilia’s efforts to bond with William do not go well and succeed only in making both Carolyn and Jack think less of her.

Despite everything, Emilia tries to maintain the Positivity in her life, by sidestepping the constant criticism & insults. She encourages William & tries very hard to become his friend.

After pregnancy, Carolyn starts legal proceedings to separate Emilia’s contact with William, insinuating that she cannot be trusted with children as she does not care for them. Implying that Emilia killed her own child. Jack resists Carolyn but is also frustrated with Emilia for taking unnecessary risks with William that give ammunition to Carolyn to attack both of them. Jack is also overwhelmed by Emilia hatred to her own father (who cheated & then divorced her mother) & says that Emilia married Jack because Jack was like her own father.

After trying to carry the load on her own, her life finally collapses, and Jack tells her he cannot go on with the relationship.

Conquered in her crisis and increasingly unfinished, Emilia finds the courage to tell Jack of the details never confessed about the death of their daughter Isabel. Emilia has a breakdown during a fight where she reveals to Jack that the baby did not die in her crib but in fact in her arms: she believes that she killed her own baby.

Despite the fact that the couple had called an ambulance, there was nothing left to do. The terrible guilt of having killed her own daughter is the real cause of her uneasiness.

She then tells him that she can also no longer do this, and leaves Jack alone, crying over their daughter. Despite the fact that the couple had called an ambulance, there was nothing left to do. The terrible guilt of having killed her own daughter is the real cause of her uneasiness.

Carolyn phones Emilia to come to her office, after William told her he is ashamed of her for accusing Emilia of having killed Isabel, she tells her that she has personally looked into the autopsy report on Isabel, and she can confirm that Emilia did not kill her baby.

At first it appears that this information is not sinking in, and Carolyn tells her that she is going to repeat, “You did not kill your baby” until Emilia understands this. Emilia starts crying in realization that she has been punishing herself for so long, and that it was not her fault, Carolyn leaves her alone in the office to process what has just happened.

Emilia later goes to Jack and tells him the full story, and while he tells her at that point that he cannot reconcile with her, a crisis involving Carolyn’s City Hall wedding and William leads to Emilia getting through to his son and Jack saying he wants to go on a date with her, leaving Emilia happy and strongly hinting the couple will get back together soon.

On the day that Carolyn’s baby is born, Emilia takes William to the park and gives him a boat that was given to her when she was his age, she then says, “I love you William” and he replies, “I know.” He looks at her and away again and says, “Me too.”