......... says the old saying in English; however, this Spanish film more or less says the same. What price friendship? The answer to that is round about 0% interest, because instead of a bank loan, friends help out the would-be entrepreneur, who, surprise, drowns in difficulties, dragging his friends' marriages down with him. The film explains this well, but errs in becoming a little too much like a soap-opera, not only in its approach, but also in its interpretation by the actors and director. Even the occasional music lends to this atmosphere. Lack of chemistry between some of the couples also adds to some of the negative points of this film, precisely between Marta and Santiago (Marta Belaustegui and Joel Joan), rescued a little by Lola Dueñas as Ainhoa. The film does not come anywhere near producing any potential from Belaustegui.
After some rather irregular productions, such as `Malena es un Nombre de Tango' (1996) (qv) which is a rather interesting film, and `Territorio Comanche' (1997) (qv) which was a disastrous adaptation of Arturo Pérez-Reverte's book of the same name, Gerardo Herrero with `Las Razones de Mi Amigo' seems to hit somewhere in the middle neither very interesting nor a disaster. However this film does lean somewhat in the direction of `Sé Quién Eres' (2000) for which Herrero was a producer, which, at best, is a yawnful flop. With Herrero as producer, I can recommend `El Coronel no Tiene Quién le Escriba' (1999) (qv), a visual poem, absolutely delightful, among my favourite half dozen or so Spanish-language films of all time.
Apart from the fact that some of the actors look very Spanish, especially the beautiful Marta Belaustegui, and you see scenes of Madrid between so many restaurants and bar terraces you might just be watching any other US TV film of very rigid formulas and limited perspectives. However, as so often happens in healthy soap-operas, things jerk and struggle along to an ending which might be convincing to some, but might not be to many. An easy 100 minutes of your time so as to keep you lightly occupied: do not expect more and perhaps you might even be fulfilled.
I was not.
