Envious Friendship

This film is a witty look at a friendship between two women who lead very different lives. The first is Jane (Imelda Staunton), a plain-looking woman who seeks adventure in books and ideas. Antonia (Saskia Reeves), on the other hand, is beautiful and successful. Having known each other since childhood, the two maintain a tenuous relationship by dining together once a year. Nevertheless, each looms large in the psyche of the other.

Jane has for years been jealous of the way things always seem to go Antonia's way, including Jane's boyfriend, Howard. Jane lives in a cramped apartment near a railway, works in a used bookstore and has a lover who is unable to get aroused unless Jane reads him the works of Iris Murdoch. Antonia has settled for a bourgeois existence, marrying Howard and working at a high-powered publisher. She, in turn, is jealous of the freedom Jane exhibits, both in her thinking and in her behavior. It is this ironic dichotomy that fuels the film.

Jane has swallowed a great deal in maintaining her relationship with Antonia, and eventually she resolves to put an end to it. But at the same time Antonia loses her job and is abandoned by Howard. Both women experience hallucinatory revelations that enable them to see things in a different light.

This is a very funny film that adroitly blends everyday situations with outrageous happenings. It is also a very light film, and while I feel sure that most viewers will enjoy watching it, I'm not so sure they will spend much time thinking about it the next day.

-- Robert Stewart