Please Give

The movie doesn’t tell a story so much as observe from an affectionate distance as its characters dither and forgive, desperate for solace without looking like a sap. “Please Give’’ is a moral comedy that feels at times like one of the late Eric Rohmer’s deceptively breezy miniatures, or a mid-period Woody Allen movie minus the fussiness. Above all, it’s the rare film to be owned by its women, both before the camera and behind it, and its emotional barometer is one of infinitely fine gradations.

As in her previous films (“Walking and Talking,’’ “Lovely & Amazing,’’ “Friends With Money’’), Holofcener relies on her muse, actress Catherine Keener, to shoulder the tale. Keener plays Kate, who lives in SoHo and with her husband, Alex (Oliver Platt), runs a successful vintage furniture store. They get their goods from the relatives of the recently deceased — suburbanites anxious to unload mom’s ugly chairs before selling the apartment — and the built-in rapaciousness of her work is pulling Kate apart at the seams. Keener has never looked so harsh and so bereft; it’s as if her wiring were starting to show through her skin.

Kate and Alex live in a high-rise apartment and have bought the adjoining unit from Andra (Ann Guilbert), the elderly woman who still lives there. They want to break through the walls and renovate, but first Andra has to — there’s no other way to put it — die. Kate offers social pleasantries to the old lady but Andra is having none of it. (Guilbert, who long ago played Millie Helper on “The Dick Van Dyke Show,’’ is a dour-faced hoot.) If you’re going to be a vulture, you may as well admit it, and, besides, isn’t that what it takes to live in New York?

That unspoken question — what do you grab for yourself and what’s left over for everyone else? — animates all the characters. Andra has two granddaughters. Rebecca (the glorious British actress Rebecca Hall) is soft-hearted and maybe a little soft-headed, a medical technician whose gentle goodness is a matter of pride. By contrast, Mary (Amanda Peet) is beautiful and ruthless, covering her anxiety with a shell of steel.