[REVIEW] Friends with Money

[rfmcdonald]

I went in to see Friends with Money expecting not to like the film very much, but NOW's recent review was entirely correct in its rating of the film as an entertaining mid-range entry. I can't fault the actors: Jennifer Aniston's quirky single routine might be old, true, but she pulls it off well, as does Catherine Keener her character of an unhappily married screenwriter and Frances McDormand's her clothes designer trapped in a nervous breakdown. Simon McBurney, who plays McDormand's ambiguous husband (I'm now inclining towards the theory that he's closeted, not metrosexual), deserves special mention for his paradoxically precise protrayal of his character's unvoiced uncertainties. If there is a problem with the film, it's that the entertaining hostility that pervades the film's circle of Los Angeleno friends is resolved too quickly and too easily. These friends might have a lot of money indeed, but it can't make problems like their fundamental discontent go away as easily as the film claims.