TMS Movie Review: The Friend
(Bleecker Street Media)
Dog movies are probably the easiest type of film to emotionally manipulate audiences. Put a dog in a dangerous situation or have it reach old age, and the viewer is bound to be tearing up. The landmark for this subgenre contemporarily seems to be David Frankel’s Marley & Me (2008), which I remember seeing opening weekend with my whole family, and all of us crying in our theater seats during the ending. Scott McGehee & David Siegel’s new feature, The Friend, is the latest in the same vein as Marley & Me, but for the indie, middle brow, mumblecore crowd.
As if the dog comparison wasn’t enough, The Friend is centered on a struggling writer, just like Marley & Me. Here, Iris (Naomi Watts) is the longtime, close editor of respected author Walter Meredith (Bill Murray), and is in the midst of crafting her own full-length novel for the first time. When Walter suddenly dies, Iris is surprised to learn her good friend requested her as the next owner of his beloved Great Dane named Apollo. Not really a pet lover, the middle-aged single woman reluctantly accepts the responsibility while trying to finish editing Walter’s final book, write her own book and dodge the superintendent, Hektor (Felix Solis), constantly reminding her their apartment complex doesn’t allow dogs.
(Bleecker Street Media)
Noma Dumezweni plays Walter’s widow, while Carla Gugino and Constance Wu appear as his ex-wives, and Sarah Pidgeon co-stars as his estranged, grown daughter. The Friend is adapted by McGehee & Siegel from Sigrid Nunez’s award winning 2018 novel with the same title. In many ways, the new picture is similar to something like Charles Shyer’s Baby Boom (1987), but with a dog instead of a baby. The protagonist is a working woman in The Big Apple who is suddenly struck with the responsibility of guardianship. A more recent example could also be Adam Brooks’ The Life List from last week, but centered on canine companionship instead of romance. The Friend isn’t technically a bad movie, but a few little things did bug me throughout my viewing. Such as the very unnecessary 120 minute runtime and the fact that the film is set in winter, but the exterior shots look more like early spring. Despite this being in Murray’s usual wheelhouse these days, I also found it hard to see why so many women in Walter’s life were still enamored with him; especially after it’s revealed he and Iris began their history with a fling when the writer was the latter’s professor in her final semester of college.
Ultimately, if you’re a big fan of dog movies that pull at your heart strings or lightweight dramedies set in upper middle class NYC, you might enjoy The Friend. Otherwise, you could just visit Marley & Me or Baby Boom again.