Starring Jennifer Aniston. Rated PG.

Jennifer Aniston skips the lipstick, and the comedy (except of the darkest kind), for the cryptically titled Cake. Her Claire is an accident victim who’s been left scarred, in several ways, and addicted to painkillers. We know from her cynically caustic comments at a pain-support group led by Felicity Huffman that she’s also a you-know-what in the ass for people around her.

The group is still coping with a recent suicide, and a prominent photo of Anna Kendrick tells us we won’t escape without at least a few flashbacks and fantasy scenes, with our pin-cushion protagonist literally haunted by the dead woman. It’s unfortunate that young director Daniel Barnz (Beastly) and screenwriter Patrick Tobin decided to pad out their slim story with these garish (if well shot) visions, because it underlines their inability to flesh out the personality of Claire, who mostly sleeps or scrounges for Percodan and OxyContin.

They’re extremely stingy with information, making too big a deal out of gradual revelations about Claire’s accident and why she seemingly pushed away her caring husband, played by Chris Messina. Lucy Punch, Mamie Gummer, and William H. Macy have a scene or two each as incidental characters, and Sam Worthington gets a bit more as the conveniently hunky widower of Kendrick’s character.

Claire’s most significant relationship is with her overly invested housekeeper, played by Mexico’s terrific Adriana Barraza, who received an Oscar nomination for Babel. All the best passages feature them together, mostly because that’s where the story moves on to wider issues, involving class and culture conflicts in present-day Los Angeles, as well as showing off some admirably committed performances. Cake isn’t really interested in what Claire thinks about any of this, though, or if she misses her work as a lawyer and “card-carrying member of the ACLU”. In the end, the movie is just a tasteful representation of grief, generic addiction, and what actors will suffer for their craft.