Dvd
Good
A pre-WW2 drama charting the inexorable rise of the Nazis in Germany, and an intellectual German everyman who becomes seduced by an SS paycheck.
Viggo Mortensen plays John Halder. Halder is decent individual with family problems – a neurotic wife, two demanding children and a mother suffering from senile dementia. A German literature professor in the 1930s, he explores his personal circumstances in a novel advocating compassionate euthanasia. When the book is unexpectedly enlisted by powerful political figures in support of government propaganda, Halder finds his career rising. Yet with Halder’s change in fortune, his seemingly inconsequential decisions potentially jeopardize the people in his life.
Starring Viggo Mortensen, Jason Isaacs, Jodie Whittaker, Steven Mackintosh, Mark Strong, Gemma Jones
Directed by Vicente Amorim ('The Middle of the World')
Written by John Wrathall [based on the play by CP Taylor]
Drama, Adaptation | 1hr 36mins | Rated (M) | contains offensive language | Origin: UK, Germany | Official Site »
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Flicks review
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2
Good? Barely adequate more like. Brazilian director Amorim's film is only notable for providing another showcase for Mortensen's (The Lord of the Rings) total commitment to a role. Although his meek and mild professor is like the SS Version of Harry Enfield's Tim Nice But Dim, you can see him strain every sinew and furrow every brow to breathe some life into an essentially moribund character.
Unfortunately, everything else about this adaptation of C P Taylor's acclaimed 1981 play is nothing short of a mess. Tonally the film is all over the place, with a bizarre fantastical musical element, an overuse of soft focus and Isaac's (Harry Potter) cynically wisecracking Jewish wideboy not really gelling with the film's dark subject matter. And despite the movie's slim running time, John Wrathall's script also seems unsure if the main focus should be euthanasia, extra-marital affairs or the natural of evil. Perhaps they should be heeded the words of Isaacs character: “I’m a Jew, you’re a Nazi. End of Story”, and jettisoned all the subplots.
The Valkyrie - everyone speaks with an English accent - approach to the story also doesn't help with authenticity, while Simon Lacey's score is overwrought in all the wrong places. Although almost redeemed by a bold ending, Good lacks the gripping action of Black Book or the compelling storyline of The Counterfeiters to be a truly memorable Nazi collaboration movie.
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The people's reviews
Press Reviews
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Empire (UK)
2
A strong cast and good starting material doesn't manage to save this unsuccessful adaptation.
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Hollywood Reporter
Paced deliberately in a way that reinforces the tragedy of evil flourishing when good men do nothing, Good may find boxoffice returns slow to build but the film's aim is true and patient audiences will be well rewarded.
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Los Angeles Times
Regrettably, the long-delayed adaptation from director Vicente Amorim and screenwriter John Wrathall gets crushed by the weight of trying to be something more; it's really just the story of a rather ordinary but disappointing man. The filmmakers reach for metaphor and allegory, but it comes at the expense of an emotional connection.
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New York Times
In Good, the anemic screen adaptation of C. P. Taylor's play about a respectable "good German" who passively acquiesces to Hitler's agenda, Viggo Mortensen, miscast and ineptly directed by Vicente Amorim, plays John Halder, a liberal, mild-mannered literature professor who becomes a Nazi.
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NZ Herald (Russell Baillie)
2
It's a pitiful ending to a story that wants to be a parable about how the well-spoken end up doing the unspeakable, but ends up being that most remarkable of things, an utterly forgettable Holocaust film.
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Total Film (UK)
2
Good’s attempts to diagnose the cancerous spread of Nazi influence through Germany’s population in the mid-’30s is laudable, but despite Mortensen’s stoic talents Halder is just too hollow a character for this to be anything other than a vapid parable.
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Variety (USA)
Considering its theme and setting, there's something very wrong with a Good that seems merely competent, uninspired and a bit old-hat.
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