FRIENDS WITH MONEY

Year: 2006
USA: Sony Pictures Classics
UK: Sony Pictures Releasing
Cast: Jennifer Aniston, Joan Cusack, Catherine Keener, Frances McDormand, Jason Isaacs, Scott Caan, Greg Germann, Simon McBurney, Bob Stephenson, Cass Asher, Reggie Austin, Ty Burrell, Jake Cherry, K C Clyde, Bobby Coleman, Jenn Fee, Yaffit Hallely, Hailey Noelle Johnson, Will Keenan, Michael Lawson, Jane Elizabeth Mende, Kristin Minter, Patrick Robert O'Connor, Maulik Pancholy, Romy Rosemont, Troy Ruptash, Erik Rusnak, Timm Sharp, John Srednicki, Jason Thornton
Director: Nicole Holofcener
Country: USA
USA & UK: 88 mins
USA Rated: R for language, some sexual content and brief drug use
UK Certificate: 15 contains strong language and sex references
USA Release Date: 21 April 2006
USA Release Date: 7 April 2006 (Limited Release New York and Los Angeles)
UK Release Date: 26 May 2006

Synopsis

FRIENDS WITH MONEY examines the shifting relationships between four women who have been friends all of their adult lives. Now as they settle into their early middle age, their friendship is increasingly challenged by the ever-growing disparity in their individual degrees of financial comfort. It is a poignant snapshot of the way we live today, where the safe divisions that class and money have created are eroding under the unstoppable force of everyday life and the result is a painfully hilarious examination of modern life that manages to be both brutally honest and ultimately uplifting.

The three friends with money, Frannie (Joan Cusack), Jane (Frances McDormand), and Christine (Catherine Keener), share a concern for Olivia (Jennifer Aniston) who seems unable to make a living or sustain a relationship—at least by their standards. Their group examination of her lack of options magnifies each of their own doubts and concerns about the marriages and careers to which they have committed themselves.

Olivia, meanwhile, drifts through each of her friends' lives, at times avoiding the issue of money altogether, and at other times accepting her friends' painful generosity. Ultimately, Olivia will find satisfaction and stability from an unexpected place, but her own somewhat happy ending is muted by the harsh reality of the suddenly disassembled lives of her best friends.