A Good Person Review
Zach Braff returns to writing and directing after nearly ten years. He directed Going in Style in 2017 but he did not pen the script. He also has his Ex Florence Pugh as the star.
Florence plays Allison, she’s happily engaged to Nathan. One day while driving to a wedding dress fitting she is in a car accident killing her future sister-in-law and her sister-in-law’s husband.
From there, her life begins to unravel as she becomes reliant on oxy, and that reliance turns to addiction. She seeks help from an AA group. But, that group includes her would have been father-in-law Daniel played by Morgan Freeman.
Daniel is now the guardian of his grandaughter Ryan. He is having a hard enough time dealing with the death of his daughter let alone the complexities of raising a teenager.
The plot sounds like something out of an after-school special. The trailer also made it look like an after-school special. Or one of those religious films.
Which are getting bigger budgets. That new film Jesus Revolution had enough production value and a bigger star with Kelsey Grammer that I was almost fooled into thinking it was a typical Hollywood production.
Braff’s latest film doesn’t come without convention. It’s a story we have seen many times. At times Zach’s script can fall into the melodramatic and be fraught with contrivances.
In fact, if it were not for the capable hands of two actors in this film, this could’ve been a slog to get through. However, Pugh and Freeman bring layered and grounded performances.
Florence is consistently stellar, I have yet to watch her give a bad performance. She gives a heartbreaking real performance as if she has been through something like this in her life.
One of her greatest strengths is her empathetic nature. She is so empathetic that it also her to understand her characters so well it feels like she has been through her characters’ struggles.
She is one of our brightest stars and I hope it burns bright for a very long time. Along with our rising star, we have a star who has been high for many years in Morgan Freeman.
This is probably his best performance since I cannot remember when. Maybe Invictus or The Dark Knight. Which were 14 and 15 years ago. He’s still being getting paychecks but not putting in the “hard work”.
It’s good to see actors still push themselves when they do not need to. If it were not for the performances of these two actors this film would be a real slog at 129 minutes.
Though it’s contrived and melodramatic, Pugh and Freeman give stellar performances and make this film worth watching.
3/5 Stars - On another day I might give this 3.5.
