52 Films by Women Vol 8. 52. Good One (Director: India Donaldson)
Pictured : 'Let's just have a good time.' Chris ( James Le Gros , left) and teenage daughter Sam ( Lily Collias ) in a scene from writer-director India Donaldson 's 'the hiking trip where everything changed' drama, ' Good One '. Still courtesy of Metrograph Pictures (US) Good One , the feature debut of writer-director India Donaldson , is a deeply textured, seemingly low-stakes drama about being the child of divorced parents. Donaldson’s father, New Zealand-born film director Roger Donaldson , did divorce her mother, Mel Clark , but whether she behaved like her teenage protagonist, Sam ( Lily Collias ), who lives with her mother but chooses not to take sides, is none of this reviewer’s business. What I can categorically write is that her film repays three viewings – two at Cannes , one in a small arthouse cinema in Paris . It is not a film in which the characters emote, tell each other how they feel, and have a cathartic moment. Rather the film, set ove...