The Friend (2024)

White Ghost/Sad Pony

or

"What's Going To Happen To The Dog?"

As soon as it's over, you want to watch The Friend again. It's that good, with a literate script, masterful performances (from everybody, not just Naomi Watts and Bill Murray...or the dog, Bing), New York as a background, an intricately selected soundtrack, and the least anthropomorphic animal performance I've seen in a long time.

And, it's a "dog" movie.

I hate "dog" movies, usually. You know why. The dog always seems to die at the end, usually in the dramatic interest of teaching the film's protagonist a life-lesson of great import. Like "life is a gift" or "appreciate what you've got when you've got it." Blah-de-blah-de-blah. I'm cynical of the form because I hate to cry in theaters and beating me with a dead dog turns me into a blubbering wreck and I hate to throw away all the soggy popcorn. The one time I didn't was when John Wick's dog was murdered and that it inspired him to come out of assassination retirement (which I giggled at, finding it perversely ludicrous).

But, this one I rushed to see because, well, Naomi Watts and Bill Murray are in it and their taste in parts alone should sell it, some laudatory words online were mentioned, and it's based on a Booker prize-winning novel by Sigrid Nunez. All indications were for some good breeding of a project that was low-key and mildly amusing. I wasn't prepared for a great movie, but I got it in spades.

It starts with a moment of inspiration, which we're not privy to: successful author-teacher Walter Mitchell (Murray) is out on his morning "Two Bridges" jog when he sees something that delights him, but we cut away before we see what has animated him so. We see him at a dinner party where he is holding court, volubly telling the story of his discovery. By the next scene, he is dead—by his own hand, they say*—and the survivors are left wondering how such a thing could happen. What would the world be without Walter? There were so many projects in the air, so many things left undone, and he'd just met his grown daughter whom he—or any of his wives, past or present—never knew existed.

But, hardest hit seems to be Iris (Watts), ostensibly his best friend. Walter was her mentor (currently she's working on a book of his correspondence) and she, in turn, is mentoring his new/old daughter, collaborating on the book. Progress on it has been slow but, now, work on it—like Walter—has come to a screeching halt.

Walter's widow (Noma Dumezweni) has asked Iris to come see her and she has a request. Well, more of a bequest—Walter had asked that if anything happened to him that Iris should take care of his dog, Apollo, the creature that he encountered on that morning run.

"Apollo" is a 150 lb. Great Dane and Iris weighs quite a bit less and is only half-again taller. Plus, Iris' apartment is, what they call in New York, a "studio" but it could be a "prewar", but anywhere else it would be called "cramped" and if you were selling it you'd mention "simplicity" and "ease of maintenance". In no way would it be considered a kennel, and—besides—it's in a "No Pets Allowed" building. Iris is not keen on the idea and her "go-to" is to avoid the Super as long as she can and find a place to "re-home" Apollo. But, in the meantime, she picks up the dog at its temporary kennel to take to what she hopes is its temporary home in her apartment only to find that the brute jumps on her bed and spreads out, despite her protests. His forlorn look prompts Iris' neighbor to remark "There's a PONY on your bed! A SAD pony!"

A sad pony to be sure, but also the elephant in the room. Apollo is just too big to fit into her apartment without obstructing Iris' every movement. She capitulated by pulling an air mattress out of her closet and sleeping on the floor, Apollo's sad eyes never leaving her through the night. But, the two are bonded, despite the separate bed-places in that they're both grieving—she for her mentor, he for his master. One's a human, one's a dog; she's a loner, he's a pack animal, so they're both approaching each other from separate corners. And with all the inconvenience this big white ghost causes in her life, some accommodation needs to be reached, some compromise between these two living beings who've been left behind.

And, ultimately, value.

The Friend, unlike so many "dog movies", is what the AARP magazine likes to call "Movies for Grownups". The emotions are complicated and recognizable, and maybe over some folks' heads. But, a New Yorker will recognize the panic of possibly losing a rent-controlled apartment; an older person will recognize the paralysis of grief; a real dog-owner will understand the inconvenience of pet-ownership** ...beyond the dog-movie-cliché antics of four-legged tornado-damage to the feng shui. There are no easy-laugh slobber jokes. This one is about loss, responsibility, and mutual need. And a bit about survivor's guilt. And the usual "taking care of others is more fulfilling than taking care of yourself." And Watts and Murray are brilliant in this.

It's so good and funny and wise that you immediately want to see it again. Or, better yet, read the book to get all the good stuff they couldn't make room for. Sometimes, that's the best part.

* I suppose with the mention of it, I should give the number of the Suicide and Crisis Hotline—If you or a loved one are having emotional distress or thoughts of suicide, call 988 to connect with a lifeline specialist for support.—but DOGE only knows if it still exists. From what I've been able to access online, it does. 

 

** The other day something popped up in my news-feed that still makes me laugh: "Nobody has ever said 'What this house needs is a box-full of shit. Let's get a cat!'"

Mass (2021)

Thoughts and Prayers/Tantrums and Stares

or

My Truth and Reconciliation with Andre

Everybody's nervous. Judy (Breeda Wool), the administrator of the Episcopal Church is over-thinking and over-fretting. Should there be refreshments? She has too much. How should the chairs be positioned? Is the table alright? Will the noise from the church above—music lessons, choir practice—be a distraction? How about the decorations? Too much? She wants to help, but perhaps too much. Things are the way they are, and she's reassured by the social worker (Michelle N. Carter) that everything's fine. It will be fine. Don't change anything. It is what it is. They're ready. After all this time, they're ready.

 

The place may be ready, but not the participants. At this stage of the game, they all have doubts. And fears. Oh, the legalities have been taken care of. Whatever is said, can't be used in court against any of the parties; all those potentialities have been waived and agreed to by all. But, do they want to do it? Still? After all this time? What can be gained (after so much loss)? What is the point of it?

It's probably Richard (Reed Birney), who has insisted on the legalities. He seems the most defensive, the most guarded, and, right off the bat, indicates that he has some place he's going to have to go. His wife, Linda (Ann Dowd), however, is anything but. She has brought flowers for the others, the only one not empty-handed. And she is solicitous, forthcoming, open where Richard is reserved. She is the least reticent of them all and seems to be the one most in need.

The others are the Perrys, Gail (Martha Plimpton) and Jay (Jason Isaacs), middle-class (by the looks of it) and, each with an agenda but not sure how they'd get there. They are angry, but they've been angry for years, and they've tamped down their bitterness and it's come to this. Now, maybe they'll get answers. Answers to why their son is dead from a school shooting. Why Richard and Linda's son shot him.

Mass, the first film by actor-writer-director Fran Kranz, couldn't be more simple: four people in a room trying to figure out what happened, and trying to figure out each other. The way to negotiate that mine-field and get answers (if they can be found or understood). Four people, two couples, facing each other and the event that they share. It's as claustrophobic as could be and Kranz, in that limited space, has as much room to maneuver as he would if he were filming a court-room scene—the drama is on the faces and the choices he makes in framing, cutting have to be precise and pointed.

Fortunately, he has four extraordinary actors doing exceptional work; Birney, Dowd, Plimpton and Isaacs are photographed from the waist up, due to that table, and there is no place to hide, anything false will be betrayed by the camera. And every hesitation, eye-flick, every avoidance is as detectable to us as it is to the participants. We get to see the redness come into the eyes or the scowl deepen. There is no escape from the concentration of the gaze as they search for some meaning to it all, search for the beginnings of it, try to explain it, and relive it in all its horror and implications. They've been dealing with it for years. Now, they have to learn to live with it and each other.

It is edge-of-your-seat drama, but without histrionics and melodrama, and the tension already built in to the setting and the situation. It is slowly uncoiling the past, confronting mistakes and missteps, signs ignored or just fallen through the cracks, deciding the blame if blame can be found, and trying to make sense of senseless acts. There is no politics here, science is brought up but fails, and, in the end, nothing will change, the dead can't be brought back, but a future might be salvaged. To what end?

The performances are extraordinary and may be the best ensemble work of the year, each actor allowed their run through the gauntlet, but it's the cumulative effect that your remember. And you'd have to be made of stone to make it through the movie without tears being shed. For everybody.