Reel Reviews | The Friend

by Tim Gordon

Sometimes a film comes along that feels as gentle and comforting as an old blanket on a cold night, and The Friend is exactly that. Directed by Scott McGehee and David Siegel, and adapted from Sigrid Nunez’s acclaimed 2018 novel, this tender drama finds a quietly profound way of exploring grief, memory, and the unexpected ways we heal.

At the heart of the story is Iris (Naomi Watts, deeply affecting in an understated performance), a solitary writer still reeling from the loss of her closest confidant and mentor. When she unexpectedly inherits his beloved Great Dane, she’s forced to share her small New York apartment and her emotional space with this massive, grieving creature. What starts as an awkward cohabitation soon transforms into something raw and beautifully symbiotic: two wounded souls, bound by the same absence, learning how to keep moving forward together.

The film doesn’t rush its moments. Iris and the dog circle each other at first, both confined by cramped quarters and an even tighter emotional cage. Slowly, their shared solitude becomes a sanctuary. In one sense, The Friend is about a woman and her dog, but it’s also about how art, writing, and connection can offer a fragile lifeline when loss feels insurmountable.

Naomi Watts carries the film’s stillness with grace, capturing Iris’s hesitant attempts to let love and vulnerability back into her life. Bill Murray pops in as Walter, bringing his trademark deadpan charm and bittersweet warmth to a character who lingers on the periphery of Iris’s world like a ghost from a previous life. The supporting cast, including Constance Wu, Carla Gugino, Ann Dowd, and Noma Dumezweni, brings welcome texture and perspective to Iris’s journey, even if the story never strays far from its central pair.

McGehee and Siegel lean into the novel’s introspective spirit. This is a film that moves at its own deliberate pace, more a series of small, poetic moments than a tightly wound plot. Some passages feel like they’ve drifted off the page unchanged, heavy with the kind of ruminations that will resonate with anyone who’s ever poured themselves into a pet when the human world felt too sharp to navigate.

What makes The Friend linger after the credits is its gentle honesty. It doesn’t try to deliver easy answers or force sentimentality. It simply observes — a writer, a dog, a city that sometimes feels too big and sometimes unbearably small. For pet lovers especially, it’s a film that will feel familiar in the best way: a reminder that in our darkest moments, we sometimes find hope and healing in the most unexpected companions.

The Friend is a soft, observant meditation on loss and companionship, anchored by a lovely, interior performance from Naomi Watts. It won’t be for everyone, its slow pace and literary soul may drift past viewers craving a conventional story arc. But for those willing to sit with it, this is a quiet gem that understands how the animals we love can, in their way, save us.

Grade: B