Friends with Money
Friends with Money
has some amazing acting, some very clever dialogue and some perceptive
things to say about life and friendship. So why did sitting through it
feel like such a chore?
It is because all of the
characters in the movie are self-absorbed and unlikable. They are so
fixated on their little lives and their problems that you can't help but
feel that maybe they are so involved in these tiny traumas that we don't
want to add to the mountain of self-pity.
The story tracks four
longtime friends and their immediate families. They never say exactly
where they all met, you assume school though it appears that Jennifer
Aniston is at least five-ten years younger than all of the other stars.
Aniston is very good in the
totally unbelievable and rather unlikable character of Olivia. Olivia
is the one unmarried member of the circle of friends, and the one poor one.
She was a teacher (a very good one her friends insist) but quit because the
kids at her upscale school teased her about her old beat-up Honda. So
instead she cleans houses and scams free cosmetic samples and whines on and
on about her life. That'll show those spoiled kids.
The problem, besides
Olivia's whininess, is that she is a total doormat. She allows people
to walk all over her without a whimper for sex, for money, for work.
You just want to slap her and tell her to wake up and tell some of these
people off or at least just say no.
Aniston had played a very
similar character in The Good Girl, an overrated drama from a few
years ago and another example of her doing a better job of playing a
character than it deserves. Also, I'm sorry, while I know there are
such desperate, self-esteem-impaired women out there, they just don't look
like Jennifer Aniston.
Joan Cusack plays Franny, a
variation of her normal character a pinched and uptight woman who tries
to appear she is much more in control than she really is. Catherine
Keener also has a kind of nothing role, half of a married screenwriting team
who suddenly realizes towards the end of the film that her husband (Jason
Isaacs) is not concerned about her feelings which may be true, but still
seems kind of a hollow point since she was nearly as unfeeling towards her
neighbors and friends in everything leading up to this epiphany.
The last of the group is
the most annoying and again, Frances McDormand is not at all to blame for
this. She does a wonderful job acting. However, her character of
Jane is drained and draining, an angry and depressed clothing designer who
is bitter towards just about everything. She has a British husband
named Aaron (Simon McBurney) who dotes on her, but everyone thinks is gay
and he doesn't seem to be totally sure, either. (Hmmm... that
storyline isn't overused in Hollywood).
Jane's most unbelievable
affliction to me was that she wouldn't even wash her hair, though everyone
who knew her commented on it. She said that if you wash you hair you
just have to again the next day, and besides her arms get tired.
However, I was at the movie with a psychotherapist who said he had a patient
with the same affliction, she only washed her hair twice a year or so.
When he once asked her why that was, she had a similar answer to McDormand's
character and even more concise. She said it was because it didn't
change anything. Of course, that led me to think, yes it does, it
makes your hair cleaner. The world is full of things that may not be
meaningful but are still necessary.
By the time Jane's husband
finally tires of her moodiness and asks her what she has to be so miserable
about she has a good career, close friends and a loving family the
audience can't help but nod in agreement. Her angst seems totally
self-involved and indulgent. Maybe that is the way depression
goes, but it doesn't make the character any more interesting to spend an
hour and a half with at a theater.
In fact, none of the
characters in Friends with Money were people that you would want to
spend time with. When Joan Cusack's rich husband (Greg Germann,
formerly Fish in Ally McBeal) asked his wife if she would still be
friends with Olivia if they were to meet today, and she has to acknowledge
that she didn't know that they would. Truthfully, at this point in
their lives, I can't see anyone wanting to become friends with any of them.
Of course, none of these people would stop staring at their navels long
enough to notice.
(5/06)
Jay S.
Jacobs
Copyright ©2006
PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved.
Posted: May 6, 2006.
