Joint Custody question

This movie felt very realistic about how it showed a divorce in the 80's (and all the surrounding dysfunction). My parents got divorced in the early 70's and I couldn't relate to the situation in this movie on a personal level since joint custody wasn't as common in my day. I'm sure it existed by I never saw it. My father just took off so custody wasn't an issue, and my friends' fathers (who were divorced)mostly had the every other weekend and dinner once a week with the kids arrangements.

Which brings me to my question...Seems like a lot of people on this board experienced joint custody first hand. Did this movie depict it as you experienced it or were the parents a little extreme? Specifically, it struck me as very insensitive that the parents just picked the exact days the kids would be at each house - with absolutely no input from the kids about what THEY wanted. Even with an even split, they might have had some preferences about where to be on specific days. Given the ages of the kids, especially Walt, leaving them out of all decision making just seemed really disrespectful of their feelings. Of course, I realize that these parents were insensitive and disrespectful of the kids' feelings throughout, so I'm not saying this was unrealistic. I'm basically just curious about how this compared to experiences anyone here has had or saw.

When I was a kid, I was always kind of jealous of my friends who had fathers who fought for custody rights (even visitation) but after watching this movie, I feel like I had it comparatively easy.