NAOMI WATTS, BILL MURRAY IN THE FRIEND

SCOTT MCGEHEE, DAVID SIEGEL: THE FRIEND (2024) - NEW YORK FILM FESTIVAL

Of grief and a Great Dane

This is a book by Sigrid Nunez that won a 2018 National Book Award. The story explores grief for a friend through the inheritance of his dog, a 180-pound Harlequin Great Dane called Apollo. He is a pedigreed animal whom the friend found abandoned and had become very dear to him. The preparing and casting of the great Dane Bing for this role I'd already read about in a New Yorker article and is a story in itself.

Essential to the film is also the human cast, Naomi Watts as the protagonist, iris, and Bill Murray as her friend Walter who takes ill and suddenly commits suicide. Watts never ceases to be engaging and real. She gives her complete attention to a role that is detailed and specific but not particularly spectacular. This film is all about nuance, and it requires patience of the viewer. Nothing flashy happens. Murray appears only briefly but we don't need a lot of Bill Murray to believe Walter is a real and lovable man. He is the ultimate veteran and his turn is witty, natural, and complex.

The main interest is Iris' difficulty in coping with her inheritance of Apollo. She didn't expect to be chosen and the news from Walter's widow and third wife, Barbara (Noma Dumezweni) is a surprise. She is more a cat person. Anyway it's academic because her rent-controlled apartment, which has been in the family before her and by the looks of it is in a beautiful building in lower Manhattan, does not allow pets.

Nonetheless Iris gets Apollo from the pound and brings him to her apartment. He plants himself on her bed and takes it over. He won't eat at first and it emerges that he is grieving. "How do you explain death to a dog?" asks Barbara repeatedly, but you don't need to: obviously Apollo knows Walter is gone and feels the absence more acutely than anyone since he was his whole world. Apollo is a quiet, mournful presence, and writers have delighted in saying that Bing is the best actor in the film. Let's not try to compare human and animal performances. Naomi Watts is quietly fantastic.

However successfully the film captures the book, it works on its own very well.There are not the immense complications, say, of Schrader's adaptation of Russell Banks in the still-born Oh, Canada. The magic of the tale is how the practical details of taking care of an absent friend's unwieldy pet become seamlessly interwoven with the process of grieving. This is blended with other details of Iris' life as a writing teacher and writer (like Walter), flashbacks to show or explain Iris' relationship with Walter (only momentarily ever anything but friendship, but intense on that level), and other friends and places. An important figure is the super of Iris' building (Felix Solis) who must convey the bad news and the good news.

Cate Erbland of IndieWire calls The Friend "the sort of witty, wise, and warm character study we seem to be running out of these days," and I'll go along with that. This is an unusually deliberate exploration (two hours) of what might normally work better in a short book, but it takes time for Apollo (Bing) to emerge, for Iris' relationship with him to stabilize, and for the subtle elements of grief and reconciliation in the story to marinate. Recommended, and not just for dog lovers.

The Friend, 120 mins., debuted at Telluride Aug. 30, 2024, showing also at Toronto and the Hamptons, and New York, where it was screened for this review. Metacritic rating: 69% based on 7 reviews. (Now 70%, based on 35 reviews.)

_________________
©Chris Knipp. Blog: http://chrisknipp.blogspot.com/.