Unexpected phone rings received in the middle of the night usually do not bring good news. In Los Angeles-based writer-director Haley Myers-Shyer’s middling drama “Goodrich,” the main character (played by Michael Keaton) learns the hard way. A phone call from his wife wakes Andy Goodrich in the wee hours of the night, telling this shocked, isolated husband (who didn’t even notice she wasn’t home) that she has entered a 90-day Malibu rehab center to address her addiction problem, leaving Andy to care for their 9-year-old twins. years. She also told him that she would leave him once she moved out.
With his wistful gaze, distinctly arched eyebrows and the distinct ambiguity of his husky voice, the understated Keaton carries this insightful and generously composed opener, proving that the septuagenarian actor is as much a play on material grounded in earthly concerns as he is a re-creation. Playful sparkle “Beetlejuice”. This opening also happens to be among the best pieces of writing that Myers-Shyer (daughter of acclaimed directors Nancy Myers and Charles Shyer) has stocked throughout Goodrich’s filmography, and is charged with the kind of narrative economy that piques the viewer’s curiosity about the thrilling story. To come.
Through these moments of tracking Andy’s escalating attempts to understand the gravity of the situation, we learn that he wasn’t exactly a perfect husband or father — not to his young twins Billy (Vivien Lira Blair) and Moose (Jacob Kubera), and certainly not to Grace (the wonderful Mila Kunis), his daughter. From his first marriage, she is now expecting her child. Having always prioritized his work in the art world as a gallery owner, Andy still mixes up his children’s names and has no idea about his wife’s drug addiction, while everyone else in his circle seems ahead of him in sensing that something is up. She had finished taking her usual pill.
The level of Goodrich’s writing fluctuates dramatically after this eye-catching introductory segment, as scenes unfold like mini-episodes — some subtly presented, others flat and hackneyed — that are unevenly directed by Myers-Shyer’s script. At its core, its story feels like an ode to group-driven local cuisine (“We Bought a Zoo” is rated R), honoring the importance of family and community camaraderie as Andy finds his true place amid the many roles he is expected to play. In a sense, it’s the kind of cinematic comfort food we don’t get very often anymore: a film with a reliable cast that you can casually wander into on a whim, and then leave satisfied. Except that the distracted impression gets in the way of Goodrich’s good intentions, leaving one yearning for something leaner, with tighter control of speed.
Instead, the film often drags and demands some clunky editing, of the kind that has characterized many of Cher Meyers’ films, such as Baby Boom. Here, an excess of material diminishes the film’s humor and impact, although many of the story’s characters are colorful enough, when not written too artificially.
Young Billy (and innocent Blair, who’s stuck on some unwieldy lines) get the short end of the stick here, with an overly mature vocabulary and mannerisms that are annoyingly beyond her years. (For example? “Daddy, if you don’t want me to talk like I live in L.A., don’t raise me in L.A.,” the little girl sneered when Andy criticized her incorrect use of the word “like.”) Fortunately, Grace The more elegantly written negates some of this misjudgment, as the fish-out-of-water Andy comes to rely on with the twins, for help with chores and as moral support when the finances of his very stylish independent art gallery get into trouble. Elsewhere, Terry (Michael Urie), a recently single aspiring actor and father heartbroken after the departure of his husband, joins Andy’s circle of friends, giving the film a lighter feel.
A major plot point in “Goodrich” revolves around whether Andy can win the estate of a recently deceased black artist, now run by her feminist daughter, Lola (an attractive Carmen Ejogo), and save his cherished gallery from closure. This conflict occurs alongside Andy’s attempts to make good with the truly conflicted Grace, who has never experienced the kind of fatherhood that Billy and Moz now seem to have. Myers-Shyer is specific and upfront about Grace’s disappointments, which nonetheless supports her father’s last-ditch attempt to save his career while navigating the challenges of her pregnancy and her precarious future in entertainment journalism. The writer-director also shows some finesse in depicting Grace’s satisfying marriage to Pete (Danny Deferrari), giving the couple one of the most beautiful scenes of marital harmony since Pixar’s Up.
It’s a shame that Myers-Shyer’s precision on the page doesn’t extend to some of the other parts of her film. We meet Andy’s gallery employees through several disjointed scenes that don’t add up to the emotional whole. Its occasional comedic treatment of Terry verges perilously close to the dated gay best friend cliché at times, while Lola’s storyline feels like an extended plot device created in the service of Andy’s self-discovery. Although it’s refreshing to see a strong black woman who isn’t afraid to express and claim her (and her mother’s) worth, Lola comes out of the story too harshly and too abruptly.
On the whole, Goodrich’s film is one of ups and downs – much like Andy’s life – that leaves you yearning for the better film that often teases him, but never becomes that.