Title – A Good Person (2023) 

Director – Zach Braff (Garden State) 

Cast – Florence Pugh, Morgan Freeman, Celeste O’Connor, Molly Shannon

Plot – Following on from a relationship breakdown that came about from a tragic accident she was involved in, depressed Allison (Pugh) begins a friendship with Daniel (Freeman) the elderly father of one of the accidents victims as she looks to turn her life around from the hole she is currently in. 

“Neither of us chose this fate, but perhaps we can find a way to love it”

Review by Eddie on 16/10/2024

Written in the early days of the Covid-19 Pandemic and developed and filmed while they were in a long-term relationship, Zach Braff and Florence Pugh’s A Good Person is a dramedy designed too pull at the heartstrings but thanks to its contrived nature and forced emotional angles, there’s an inescapable feeling that Person isn’t the film that it desperately wants to be. 

Announcing himself of a filmmaker of note with his well-liked indie debut Garden State in 2004, beloved television actor Braff seemed destined to become the next darling of the Wes Anderson school of oddball dramedies but follow ups which were the barely seen Wish I Was Here and Going in Style knocked this theory on the head rather quickly with many hopeful Braff’s pairing with instant Hollywood heavyweight Pugh was going to be the magical moment it all came back together. 

Arriving into theatres with a tepid critical reception and even more disastrous box office results to the tune of just over $3 million in receipts worldwide, Person failed to find an audience in the post-pandemic landscape and while it’s been one of those slow burn features that has managed to find a strong enough sentiment from the casual viewer over the proceeding months its been available for home viewing, there’s very little in Person that would make one recommend seeking it out of a loaded marketplace. 

Unable to differentiate itself from a range of similar films that tackle weighty subject matters around confronting material and oddball charms, Person asks a lot of its leading lady who has to bring the PTSD suffering turned painkiller addicted Allison to life in the aftermath of an horrific car accident that ended close friends lives, halted hers in her tracks and also ended her relationship with partner Nathan (played by Chinaza Uche). 

So good in many of the lead turns she has delivered over recent years, this is the first time you really feel Pugh struggling with the weight of her task and whether it comes from Braff’s rather on the nose script, poorly attuned characters or unnatural delivery, there’s little Pugh can do but go along for the ride that includes a lot of awkward and forced scenes with Morgan Freeman’s Daniel with whom Allison strikes up an unlikely friendship with on the road to her recovery. 

As starkly and basically as it can be put, there’s an overarching sense that Person borrows a lot from other films and other narratives, nothing here that Braff has conjured up feels like a fresh or original take on big life issues such as love, life, the human condition or overcoming ones inner demons and while there are small glimpses of the filmmaker many feel in love with when Garden State arrived, there’s little on show here to suggest that Braff is any closer to recapturing the lightning in a bottle moment he caught back in 2004. 

Final Say – 

A film that doesn’t earn or warrant any of its supposed big moments or life teachings, A Good Person never appears to be coming at you from a place of sincerity and its characters and story are unable to be helped along by a hamstrung Florence Pugh who delivers one of her rare “off” performances here. 

2 model train sets out of 5