It can be assumed that the two Kramers referred to in this film’s title are Ted (the dad) and Joanna (the mom). After all, the film revolves around their inability to work through the issues in their marriage and culminates in their vicious court battle for custody of their young son Billy. However, a large chunk of the film focuses on Ted and Billy trying to cope with Joanna’s abandonment of them and discovering their self-sufficiency as well as a new and much deeper love for each other. In this sense, the title of the movie might be applied just as much to the Kramer males—at least until they are no longer at odds with one another. Speaking of males, the two Kramer boys’ determination to stick together and make the best of their new life without Joanna introduces a very strong underlying theme in Kramer vs. Kramer, one that deals with the fundamental/traditional differences between men and women (who the film seems to say are not as dissimilar as people may think).

It is interesting to note that in the case of the Kramers it is the mother who leaves, not the father, which is a bit non-stereotypical. Although Ted is an uninformed, uninvolved, more than slightly chauvinistic husband and father at the opening of the film, by the end (spoiler alert!) he is nearly the complete opposite. When he’s not at work, Ted spends all his time with Billy. When he is away from Billy, he only wants to talk about his son. He even goes so far as to admit to Billy that he blames himself for Joanna’s exit from their lives: “I kept trying to make her be a certain kind of person. A certain kind of wife that I thought she was supposed to be. And she just wasn’t like that…I think that she tried for so long to make me happy… and when she couldn’t, she tried to talk to me about it. But I wasn’t listening. I was too busy, too wrapped up… just thinking about myself. And I thought that anytime I was happy, she was happy. But I think underneath she was very sad.” Ted had not noticed Joanna’s unhappiness, had not made it his goal to ensure that she felt her life had as much significance as his.

Joanna’s tearful plea for custody of Billy.

On the flip side, Joanna doesn’t seem to change much over the course of the film. In the opening moments, she tells Billy she loves him, but minutes later she leaves him. In the courtroom scene near the end (spoiler alert!), Joanna seems to overlook the fact that the purpose of the hearing is to decide what is best for Billy, not what is best for her. Almost to the close of the film, Joanna is concerned with only herself. Personally, I didn’t feel confident that, should Joanna regain custody of Billy, she would not drop him off on Ted’s doorstep someday when she again decided that her life wasn’t “interesting” enough when she was “just” Billy’s mom.

But, spoiler alert again, Joanna—the abandoner—is granted custody of Billy, a child she has only watched from café windows and spent one afternoon with in nearly two years. Disgusting. The film’s point with this shocking turn of events seems to be to draw attention to the preference given to the traditional belief that women are better parents and caretakers than men. Ted brings up this issue when he takes the stand during the hearing: “My wife used to always say to me, ‘Why can’t a woman have the same ambitions as a man?’ I think you’re right, and maybe I learned that much. But by the same token, I’d like to know what law is it that says that a woman is a better parent simply by virtue of her sex…What is it makes somebody a good parent? You know, it has to do with constancy. It has to do with…with, with patience. It has to do with listening to him. It has to do with pretending to listen to him when you can’t even listen anymore. It has to do with love…and I don’t know where it’s written that says that a woman has, has a corner on that market, that, that a man has any less of those emotions than, than a woman does.” I think Ted’s right. Parenting is an effort, one which Joanna neglected. It shouldn’t matter that Joanna is female and Ted is male. Ted stayed, and Joanna left.

For Me Then…

Billy and Ted making life work.

To sum up Ted’s remarks on what makes a successful parent: a good parent is not perfect, but is present. Sure, Joanna’s life was marked with struggles—she wanted to enjoy professional success and personal independence—but she chose to marry, just like she chose to have a child with Ted. Success and independence are just lovely, but there’s also this thing called responsibility. And one would think that love would have a say somewhere as well. True love is a choice to yield to the best interest of others. Ted does not demonstrate this kind of love to Joanna in their marriage, so she leaves him. Joanna does not show this type of love to Billy when she abandons him and when she selfishly wants to snatch him from the patched-up stability of his life with his father. What a mess.

I think Kramer vs. Kramer offers its viewers the best solution to its conflict that it can for the worldview to which it subscribes. Joanna’s sacrificing her renewed desire to raise her son in order for him to be able to grow up in his home with his father hints at both an improvement in her character and the power of selfless love for another. Likewise, Ted’s standing aside to allow Joanna some uninterrupted time with Billy—in the room that she painted for him—also demonstrates his personal growth as both a man and a parent.

Yet regardless of the positive changes in the two main characters, it is a tragic certainty that Billy will grow up with scars from the strain of his parents’ rocky marriage and his mother’s abandonment. What the film doesn’t offer its viewers in the end is a more permanent and fulfilling solution to the pain of divorce and desertion—the aforementioned love, in which can be found the power to heal broken marriages and to change parental obligation to delight.