An L.A. art gallery owner and father of two has to step up for his kids when his wife checks herself into rehab in Goodrich, now playing in Prague cinemas. This low-energy but mildly engaging comedy-drama gets a huge boost from Michael Keaton‘s immensely empathetic central performance, which transcends some otherwise bland material to make this one genuinely worth catching.
Keaton stars as Andy Goodrich, awoken in the film’s opening scene by a phone call from his wife (Laura Benanti, unseen for most of the movie), who informs him that she’ll be absent for the next 90 days while undergoing treatment for a prescription pill addiction that Andy didn’t even know about. For the next three months, Andy will suddenly have to play Mr. Mom for their two kids, nine-year-old twins, Billy (Vivien Lyra Blair) and Mose (Jacob Kopera).
Beyond that, Andy has to save his struggling art gallery, which has just lost a major client but may have a shot at gaining the estate of another through Lola Thompson (Carmen Ejogo), whose mother, a famous painter, has recently died And he must also repair a relationship with his adult daughter Grace (Mila Kunis), now pregnant, who sees Andy work to become the father to his two young kids that he never was for her.
How will he survive? The dramatic thrust of Goodrich is in discovering how this character will manage, but like the Sarah Jessica Parker vehicle I Don’t Know How She Does It, the answer is right up there on the screen: Andy’s sprawling Beverly Hills estate, the resort-like rehab his wife checks into, his multistory art boutique on prime L.A. real estate, his kids’ private school and the nanny/babysitter always on call… money.
There’s an appealing theme in Goodrich about Andy letting go of attachments: to the wife he assumed would always be there, the career to which he dedicated so much of his life, that 31-year-old bottle of whiskey. And rediscover what really matters to him: the daughter he long ignored, and the two kids that he was taking a similar path with.
But it would be so much more interesting to watch a real person go through this struggle; unlike most, Andy has a safety net that renders much of the drama inconsequential. External threats slowly bubble up during the course of Goodrich, but unlike, say, Will Smith‘s struggling father in The Pursuit of Happyness, Andy has the privilege of letting them slide right off him. The over-the-top opulence of these characters makes it almost impossible to empathize with them.
But only almost, because Keaton is at his most likable throughout the course of the movie, and turns what might have been a shallow character into one of genuine depth. The film tells us he was a bad father and bad husband, but the character we see up on the screen is kind-hearted and well-intentioned, and says the right thing at every moment; despite how unrelatable this character should be, Keaton’s subtle tact turns Andy into someone we root for and empathize with at every turn
He’s aided by the supporting cast in Goodrich, and especially Kunis as his adult daughter, who matches Keaton in charisma and has two standout scenes towards the film’s climax. Also good here are Kevin Pollak as Andy’s art gallery associate Cy, Michael Urie as a fellow single parent with whom he forms a bond, and Andie MacDowell in a wonderful single-scene cameo as Andy’s ex-wife.
Writer-director Hallie Meyers-Shyer, the daughter of Nancy Meyers and Charles Shyer, previously made the underrated but more conventional Reese Witherspoon romantic comedy Home Again. In Goodrich, she digs for some deeper thematic material in the vein of 1970s-style character studies, and thanks to some terrific performances, at least dances around some profound truths.
Goodrich often feels confined to an insular L.A. bubble, but some deeply human performances breathe life into a story that might otherwise seem detached from everyday struggles. It’s a modest film with understated charm, but the heartfelt exploration of personal growth and redemption realized in Keaton’s engaging central turn makes it one worth seeking out.
