FRIENDS WITH MONEY ***

 If this small gem of a movie feels at times like an extended episode of a really rather good television series, don't knock it. Good television these days is often so much better than many mainstream movies. Nicole Holofcener made "Friends with Money" in 2006 and the friends, as we have come to expect from Holofcener, are female though the title is a misnomer since not all the friends have money. They are Frances McDormand, Catherine Keener, Joan Cusack and Jennifer Aniston and Aniston is the poor one. She's also the single one; the others are married to Simon McBurney, Jason Isaacs and Greg Germann and like all good friends they not only interact but interfere in each other's lives.

As you might also expect from Holofcener, "Friends with Money" is often very funny, touching and whip-smart and all four women are superb with Aniston proving the real surprise. The men mostly trail behind them though Britain's McBurney is excellent as McDormand's husband that everyone just assumes is gay while Scott Caan makes for a terrific sleaze-ball of a personal trainer who will sleep with any woman that moves. Never destined for mainstream success, this may have slipped off the radar but it's a movie that cries out for rediscovery.