Witty 'Friends with Money' is time pretty well spent

Jennifer Aniston doesn't seem to be venturing too far from her middle-class TV Friends in the world of Friends with Money.

Rachel, her indelible sitcom character, has become Olivia, the only one of four middle-aged gal pals who has no mate or career.

Olivia, a former teacher who is now cleaning houses, is a mellow (sometimes downbeat) pot-smoker who is hooked on a married man. Olivia may not be as likable as Rachel, but she is cut from the same cloth. Indeed, she could be the older sister of her character in The Good Girl, the 2002 film in which Aniston played a depressed, pot-smoking 30-year-old wife who takes up with a younger co-worker (Jake Gyllenhaal). Though she did a fine job in that film, lately Aniston seems to be struggling to find the right role for her talents.

In the past year she has starred in the bombs Rumor Has It and Derailed. It remains to be seen whether her chemistry with Vince Vaughn in The Break-up, opening in June, will enable her to carve out a new life on the big screen.

It's her co-stars who shine in writer/director Nicole Holofcener's ensemble comedy. Holofcener, who made Lovely & Amazing and Walking and Talking, has a keen eye for the nuances of female friendships and for the tenuous comfort of financial stability. Her focus is trained squarely on the world of white, wealthy Southern Californians, and she captures their milieu astutely.

Frances McDormand is excellent as a neurotic clothing designer and mother. Her character is the most multifaceted; she comes across as alternatively intelligent and thoughtful and frighteningly unhinged. Catherine Keener is also strong as a screenwriter whose marriage to her writing partner, played by Jason Isaacs, is splintering in the midst of their elaborate home remodeling. Joan Cusack plays the third friend and the wealthiest, but the underdeveloped role doesn't tap her quirky humor.

The men are intended to take the back seat, but Simon McBurney as McDormand's husband of murky sexuality is as compelling as any of the women.

The film is likable, with some funny moments and recognizable human conflicts. But the origin of the women's friendship is not explained, and the nature of Olivia's problems is not examined or taken very seriously, making her seem inexplicably lost and shallow. Sharply observed and cleverly written, in the end, the film is also a bit superficial, like its characters' lives.