(Florence Pugh, Molly Shannon, Chinaza Uche, Celeste O’Connor, Zoe Lister-Jones, et al / Blu-ray + Digital / R / 2023 / Warner Bros. Pictures)

Overview: Daniel (Morgan Freeman) is brought together with Allison (Florence Pugh), the once thriving young woman with a bright future who was involved in an unimaginable tragedy that took his daughter’s life.

As grief-stricken Daniel navigates raising his teenage granddaughter and Allison seeks redemption, they discover that friendship, forgiveness, and hope can flourish in unlikely places.

Blu-ray Verdict: For those not in the know, A Good Person is a new drama film directed and written by Zach Braff, director of Garden State and Going in Style.

Alison (Florence Pugh) lives the perfect life with a great career, a loving fiancée, and close friends and family. When she experiences a tragic accident, it changes her entire life. As a result of the accident, she ends up back at her mother’s house and becomes addicted to pain-relieving pills.

While battling her depression and addictions, she develops a close relationship with Daniel (Morgan Freeman), the man who would become her future father-in-law before the accident. During their relationship, they learn that they are both struggling with the tragic consequences of the accident and now try to support and help each other in this.

With this new outting, Zach Braff tries to respond more to the drama sides of a film. Since his 2004 directed film Garden State, his other directed films have kept more on the comedic side with just a hint of drama. In this film, he now responds better to the consequences that people experience after experiencing tragic, dramatic events. This is also a subject that many people can identify with, so that the film can strike a personal chord.

What helps to convey this well and believably is the acting of the protagonists. Pugh (his real life girlfriend at the time of filming) comes across as an addict, trying to escape her dark past and mistakes, but only doing so in the wrong way.

With this role she shows again what kind of good acting she knows how to put down in films despite the genre. Besides her, Morgan Freeman also puts in some good acting. He also plays someone with a traumatic past, who also tries to master the traumas of his past and his new traumas.

With the film having a wee bit too long of a run time, it can come across as a bit long-winded at times, or remain more on the predictable side, but that doesn’t take anything away from Braff’s quite mesmerizing, genuinely heartfelt and real, cinematic styling.

Perhaps Braff should have looked a little closer at his own story and left some unnecessary things out of the movie, but nonetheless, the acting is exceptional across the board - Nathan’s Dad, Daniel (Freeman), niece Ryan (O’Connor), Allison’s Mum, Dianne (Shannon) and sponsor, Simone (Lister-Jones).

All have significant roles in how they interact with Pugh, who puts on a masterclass, at times trying to be brave, others completely at a loss - and you feel it all with her. I think she’ll be around for a long, long time, especially in roles like this, because, and trust me on this, even her songs within the movie are good!

Celebrated writer/director Zach Braff’s (TV’s “Scrubs,” “Garden State”) latest film A Good Person, from Metro-Goldwyn Mayer Pictures, will be available for purchase on Blu-ray on May 30th, 2023.

Written and directed by Braff, the film sees Braff once again return to the director’s chair nearly twenty years after his Sundance breakout directorial debut, “Garden State.” The film is produced by Zach Braff, Pamela Koffler, Florence Pugh, Christine Vachon, Christina Piovesan and Noah Segal.

A Good Person stars Academy Award® nominee Florence Pugh (“Don’t Worry Darling”, “Little Women”), Molly Shannon (TV’s “The White Lotus”, “Saturday Night Live”), Chinaza Uche (TV’s “Wool”), Celeste O’Connor (“Ghostbusters: Afterlife”) and Academy Award® Winner Morgan Freeman (“Million Dollar Baby”, “The Shawshank Redemption”).

A Good Person will be available on Blu-ray on May 30th, 2023 for $ 34.98 (SRP).

www.MGM.com