The Friend review: Disjointed elements make this frustrating pooch drama one for the doghouse

The Sun

24-04-2025

The Friend
★★☆☆☆
4
4
THE tale of a reluctant owner falling in love with a problematic pooch has played out many times on the big screen.
Turner & Hooch, Marley & Me and Beethoven had generations of cinemagoers sobbing over their popcorn.
And now The Friend has given this well-trodden dog walk a go.
Iris (Naomi Watts) is a novelist dealing with the suicide of her friend Walter (Bill Murray) — a fellow writer and troubled genius.
We see snippets of their complicated friendship through flashbacks.
According to Walter's wife, he requested that Iris look after his beloved rescue dog, Apollo.
Iris lives in a tiny New York apartment that doesn't allow dogs and, unfortunately for her, Apollo is no chihuahua.
He's actually a 150lb great Dane with a bad case of the doggy blues.
Since Walter's death, Apollo has become deeply depressed. He won't eat, won't play and spends hours lying on top of one of Walter's old T-shirts breathing in his dead owner's smell.
And Iris, who declares herself a 'cat person', has to try and get him out of this fog while learning a lot about herself in the process.
But it's Apollo who seems so much sadder about his owner's death than any of his ex-wives, daughter or, in fact, Iris.
Which is one of the many disjointed elements in this slightly frustrating film.
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The viewer is invited to believe that Walter and Iris have this powerful friendship, yet she barely seems to have shed a tear over his death and even lazily arrived late to his funeral.
The conversations about him lack information and left me craving another Bill Murray flashback so I could try to understand who he was myself.
And the character of Iris feels weak. She doesn't finish sentences, she stares off into the distance a lot and can't seem to do a day's work without there being some sort of slightly pathetic disaster. I wanted to see her get mad or sad . . . something.
Apollo is superbly cast, though, and with his big, mournful eyes and expressive head turns, he often resembles Bill Murray trapped inside a canine.
And there are some lovely New York Brownstone home interiors to stare at during the Woody Allen-style dialogue.
But, sadly, this pooch drama is one for doghouse.
THE ACCOUNTANT 2
(15), 124mins
★★★☆☆
4
BEN AFFLECK returns as Christian Wolff in a belated sequel to the 2016 hit that delivers plenty of guilty-pleasure action.
Chris has been quietly living off-grid in Boise for a few years and is still working on shady financial jobs through his handler Justine.
When a tragedy draws him back into the fray, he reconnects with Marybeth Medina (Cynthia Addai-Robinson) and his estranged brother Braxton (Jon Bernthal), an assassin now living in Europe.
Where the first film took itself slightly too seriously, this follow-up embraces a more playful tone.
It's a mishmash of crime syndicates, missing children and hitmen, all barely held together by a rather weak premise.
But that's surely part of the appeal. Affleck keeps Chris cool and calm, while Bernthal's Braxton does what he does best: Fight first and ask questions later.
Sure, the plot's a mess and the portrayal of neurodivergence might raise an eyebrow, but director Gavin O'Connor pulls off a decent crime caper as unapologetically ridiculous as it is fun.
The Accountant 2 is clearly having way too much fun to worry about making perfect sense.
★★★★☆
4
THIS striking debut from Norwegian director Emilie Blichfeldt reimagines the classic Cinderella fairytale.
The film blends gothic horror, dark humour, and feminist critique, transforming the story into a grotesque, visually impressive body-horror drama with surreal undertones.
Following the death of her wealthy new husband – he croaks it mid-cake at their wedding – cynical Rebekka (Ane Dahl Torp) is left broke and obsessed with marrying off her plain daughter Elvira (Lea Myren).
Neglecting basic decency by leaving the corpse of her newly dead husband to rot while pouring resources into brutal beauty treatments for Elvira, Rebekka hopes to attract Prince Julian at a royal ball.
Meanwhile, Elvira's rivalry with glam new stepsister Agnes (Thea Sofie Loch Naess) intensifies, especially as Elvira resorts to ingesting a tapeworm to satisfy her cake cravings.
Rather than recycling clichés, Blichfeldt interrogates patriarchal ideals and fetishised beauty, pitting young women against each other.
A smart, bold, and visually rich work that both enchants and challenges.
By Linda Marric