Good

Based on the play by C.P. Taylor, Good follows WWII-era professor John Halder (Viggo Mortensen) as he finds himself slowly-but-surely drawn into the Nazi party after several high-ranking officials take an interest in his work. Director Vicente Amorim has infused Good with a laid-back, exceedingly deliberate sensibility that presumably reflects the source material, yet there’s little doubt that the viewer quickly grows antsy for something (anything) of interest to occur. Amorim, working from John Wrathall’s screenplay, generally places the emphasis on the minutia of Halder’s day-to-day activities, which, though effective in fleshing out the character, imbues a palpable vibe of uneventfulness into the proceedings that’s ultimately impossible to overlook. It’s only as Halder is reluctantly swept into the Nazi party that Good becomes a relatively intriguing piece of work, with the inclusion of several admittedly captivating subplots (eg Halder attempts to find out just what happened to his Jewish friend (Jason Isaacs’ Maurice)) proving instrumental in temporarily lifting the film out of its doldrums. One’s ability to wholeheartedly embrace the story is consistently hampered by the distinct atmosphere of staginess and artificiality, with the head-scratching decision to allow the actors portraying Germans to speak accented English certainly standing head and shoulders above the movie’s various problems. It’s subsequently difficult to label Good as anything more than a well-intentioned misfire, although, to be fair, it’s impossible to understate the effectiveness of the film’s haunting, downright jaw-dropping final shot (which follows Halder as he takes an Atonement-esque tour of a concentration camp).

** out of ****