Friends With Money Review

Friends with Money is about a group of friends all with varying success. One is a famous fashion designer, the other a successful writer, one married a rich man and wants for nothing, and the other is struggling financially in the midst of a career change. Each of the friends have something they’re struggling with for the duration of the film, which causes conflict in their personal lives. The friendship is the constant in this movie and is hardly tested despite the financial inequities and personal struggles. 

For Olivia (Jennifer Anniston), seemingly the main character of the story, her struggle is finding herself a path in life. She’s been making the wrong decisions when it comes to guys; her most notable relationship mentioned was with a married man she was seeing for two months who no longer takes her calls. She begins cleaning homes in order to pay her bills after quitting her job as a school teacher. Her friends don’t understand why she would make this decision, nor do they like seeing their friend single. Olivia spends the duration of the film cleaning houses and hooking up with Franny’s personal trainer (who is not a good person), which adds to both her financial and relationship struggles. 

Christine (Catherine Keener) thinks she has it all. She has a beautiful son, a thriving writing career, and her beautiful home. Her husband and her begin to add a new addition to their home, which begins to reveal cracks in their marriage.

Jane (Frances McDormand) already has everything she could ever want. Instead of joy, this fills her with a great depression. She no longer finds joy in seeing people wear her designs, and she has quit washing her hair. Her depression puts a strain on her marriage as he begins a flirtatious friendship with a man he met at the coffee shop.  

Franny (Joan Cusack) married a rich man and lives an easy life. She is just beginning to navigate parenthood and her own wealth. Franny does what she can for her friends, but often falls short. She begins to wonder if she would be friends with some of her less fortunate friends at all if she had been wealthy all her life.

While the friends are connected through their long-time friendship, little else holds their group together. We see the friends interacting with one another few times throughout the movie. On most of the occasions we see all the friends together, there is a very clear disconnection between Olivia and the other women. She doesn’t have what they have, and while they want what’s best for her, their opinions and observations about her life are often insensitive. There is clear classism between the friends and this is something I wish the writer would have leaned into more heavily. I believe if this movie were made today instead of in 2006 there would be a greater narrative around the distinct differences in the friend group’s wealth. 

The few times we see all the friends together and well connected, there seems to be something missing. I’m not sure if it’s because we don’t really get any backstory on how the friends met or what keeps them together, but the friendship feels very forced. While all the women are spectacular in their own individual side stories, something falls flat when they’re all together. In fact, I believe the only scene in which I felt any chemistry or connection between the women was when they were trying on some of Jane’s designs before a charity event Franny paid for a table at. During this scene they are all trying on clothes and complimenting each other, as well as Jane’s designs. This is the only scene in the movie in which the women seem like genuine friends. Otherwise, they’re gossiping behind each others’ backs, making assumptions about each other’s lives, or just aren’t communicating with each other at all. They’re there for the important moments in the movie, but few other times does their friendship seem genuine. 

The movie ends in a very deep and significant way, but simultaneously doesn’t. We see Olivia get seemingly everything she ever wants after taking a chance on a different kind of man. I don’t want to spoil the end of the movie for the readers who will want to go watch this movie, but I feel like Olivia’s view of success is very skewed. I would say this is partially because of her friends, but also because of her own standards for success. Her definition of “making it” seems a bit shallow, in my opinion, but the character’s happiness was really enjoyable to see; especially since Olivia seems miserable most of the film.  

The movie ends with Olivia’s admission that she has “problems”. Throughout the film, we see all her friends struggling with their own set of problems. As viewers, I believe we are supposed to take from this that it doesn’t matter what financial or romantic situation someone is in; everyone has problems of all different shapes and sizes. I feel like this was a great way to end this movie and wrap up the events of the film. 

This movie was definitely not the best movie I’ve ever seen, but it was pretty good. Jennifer Anniston was incredible, as always, and all the women gave excellent performances. There were a few dated jokes, but nothing that felt overly offensive. Overall, the movie was a good watch.