Friends With Money

The first movie I got with my new Netflix queue was Friends With Money, which came out about a year ago, but I never got around to seeing it. I like girly movies, but don't often find anyone who'll go see them with me, so now that I have my very own Netflix queue, I imagine I'll see many more chick flick comedies and dramas.

But I digress. All I heard about FWM when it came out was that it wasn't good, so I went into it thinking that maybe I would like it a little but would probably deem it sort of lame. Instead, I was pleasantly surprised by how good this movie was, and how much I liked it. Joan Cusack, Catherine Keener, and especially Frances McDormand are great in FWM. They play the friends with money, in varying degrees of wealth, all with fabulous jobs or so wealthy that they don't work at all. Jenny Aniston, on the other hand, is the pothead former-teacher-turned-maid, and while I appreciate her for breaking out of that "Rachel" mode, she's just not as good as the other three ladies. That doesn't mean she does a terrible job in this film - on the contrary, she's actually pretty good. It's just that Joan, Catherine and Frances are so good that Jen looks pretty bleak in comparison.

What I liked best about FWM is that, even though it's definitely a "chick flick," it's not a romantic comedy - it's a dramedy, with more fun than failure, but with enough low points and intellect that I didn't feel dumber after I was done watching it - and I like that.

Friends With Money - B+