With Friends Like These

Two friends in their forties and their partners have been keeping the same arrangement going for years. Then one of them falls ill and the group has to get through a weekend in which death is not discussed. The old lies among them come out in the process. The film is not interested in the illness. It is interested in the contract of politeness inside a friendship: these people have known each other for years and none of them really talks. The film breaks the silences one at a time and comforts nobody. The form is realist and everyday: house, kitchen, garden, long scenes and dialogue close to improvisation. It is early work by Felix van Groeningen, who would later reach an international audience with The Broken Circle Breakdown; this is smaller in scale but looks from the same place, at how a group carries what it has lost. Who it is for: viewers who like Belgian cinema and ensemble drama. Who it is not for: anyone wanting pace. The film is slow and does not give most of its characters enough time.