"A Good Person" -- Movie Review

 

This week at Lincoln Center, I attended an advance screening of the new drama by writer/director Zach Braff, “A Good Person”, starring Florence Pugh and Morgan Freeman.

Synopsis

When a tragic accident seriously disrupts a young woman’s life, will she be able to kick the drug habit she developed during her recovery?

Story

Allison (Pugh) and Nathan (Chinaza Uche) seem headed for a bright future together – following their engagement party, they begin planning their wedding; Nathan’s sister Molly (Nichelle Hines) and her husband are helping – but their estranged father Daniel (Freeman) is being completely left out.  On the way to try on wedding gowns, Allison gets into a disastrous traffic accident.  She is seriously injured and her passengers – Molly and her husband – are killed, leaving their teenage daughter Ryan (Celeste O'Connor) orphaned.  As an elderly widower, Daniel finds himself trying to raise her by himself.

After spending an extended period in the hospital followed by physical therapy, Allison now finds her life turned upside down.  She has broken things off with Nathan and to make matters worse, she is now addicted to Oxycontin – an opioid prescribed to her by her physicians in order to help her deal with the physical pain she was forced to endure during her recovery from the accident.  With her doctors refusing to renew her prescription, Allison becomes desperate and tries to score the pills any way she possibly can.  As a result, she winds up ruining a great many of her personal relationships over time. 

When Allison finally relents and tries to seek help through a 12-step program, she runs into Daniel, who himself is a recovering alcoholic.  Despite blaming Allison for the loss of his daughter, the two eventually wind up forming something of a kinship in order to help each other get over their grief as well as their individual addictions.  Over time, Allison meets Ryan; while Ryan initially harbors hard feelings towards Allison for causing the death of her parents, she eventually softens and they become friends.  When the two spend a night on the town together, a series of events cause things to spiral out of control for all involved – but will they be able to prevent any further tragedies or will things go too far? 

Review

Writer/director Zach Braff has set out on an ambitious effort with “A Good Person” (although the title is a bit nondescript and may not attract people to see it in a theatrical release, which is planned before moving to Amazon’s streaming service).  Part of the problem, however, is that the movie is a bit of a slog – even though it’s only a little over two hours, it feels much longer because of the intensity of the story being told.  The infrequent attempts at humor aren’t terribly funny and quite often feel misplaced.  While Morgan Freeman gives his usual steady performance, it is not worth recommending this film. 

Another issue here is that the conclusion of “A Good Person” stretches the concept of deus ex machina beyond its reasonable limits, requiring the viewer to substantially suspend disbelief.  There arise far too many coincidences as the movie attempts to drive towards a dramatic climax, to the point where you feel like you’ve been hoodwinked into watching a completely different film.  Ultimately, the emotional response we’re supposed to have is somewhat tempered by virtue of the fact that there have already been too many demands on the audience by this point and you are simply left exhausted. 

A post-screening interview was conducted with co-producer Pamela Koffler from Killer Films.  After discussing the history of her production company and her association with it, Koffler talked about the movie itself.  She was originally emailed a copy of the script, being informed that both Pugh and Freeman were attached to the project and that it had already been financed.  The entire production was shot in Braff’s home of New Jersey, which provided considerable tax credits for the project.  Koffler then went on to explain in detail exactly how these tax credits work in that for every dollar that is spent, the state gives it back in the form of a tax credit.