Good (DVD)

Good is one of those small movies that’s a joy to discover. Although not perfect, it’s a fascinating look at the endless small moral choices we make each day and what they can add up to. The film has been criticised for not being a good enough Nazi/Holocaust film, however that’s slightly unfair, as this isn’t just a film about the choices made people in one country before 1945.

The problem is that as WWII and the Holocaust is such a monolith that towers over the 20th Century, when you make a film like this, that’s all people can see, and admittedly purely on those terms, Good does seem like a fairly small, slow film, but there’s more to it than that.

The renewed interest in films about the moral culpability of those involved in Nazism, such as Good, Valkyrie and The Reader (and to some extent Inglourious Basterds), seems to have stemmed from a growing unease in our own era about the actions governments have taken, which the population may not have liked but which they’ve done little to prevent. Good is a parable not just about the compromises people made under an evil, totalitarian system, it’s about the choices people make all the time. Indeed Good is careful to start well before the war, when some may have not liked the Nazis, but no one knew their final aims, and no one could have known what their cumulative moral lapses might add up to.

Viggo Mortenson plays John Halder, a German university lecturer who comes to the attention of the Nazis after they read his novel, which is a romantic account of a husband who helps his wife die when she becomes terminally ill. They want him to write a paper exploring the moral issues of euthanisia – a seemingly simple request (of course Halder has no way to know they’re actually hoping to justify killing the mentally ill) – so he agrees, even though he generally disagrees with the Nazis’ philosophy. This starts a series of choices, most of them seemingly minor compromises for an easier life or better social status, until a few years later Halder realises he hasn’t just become complicit in the Nazi regime, but he’s intimately involved in something that could lead to the death of his Jewish friend (Jason Isaacs). By that time he’s awash with regret, but there’s little he can do. And does he have the will to try anyway?

Good has its problems, such as the fact that while Viggo Mortenson acts his heart out as the mild-mannered Halder, he doesn’t really draw the viewer in. We watch from the outside, judging his actions, rather than being drawn inside with him. There’s also a rather distracting hangover from the much-praised C.P. Taylor stage play, which sees Halder hearing Mahler at time of moral confusion. It’s the sort of thing that might work in the theatre, but seems unnecessary, ‘stagey’ and false here, especially as the film is otherwise told in a pretty straightforward fashion.

However the films strengths are what some have seen as its weaknesses. There are few grand gestures, no massive acts of heroism to redeem the conflicted protagonist, and no comeuppance other than a personal one. It’s merely about the cumulative effect of small moral choices and the way people can justify doing the ‘wrong’ thing. It’s about the difference between our theoretical morals and what we’d do when presented with that situation in reality, the subtle seductions of having our ego stroked, and how we can convince ourselves we’re still a ‘good’ person, right up to the point where we’re standing in front of a mirror in full Nazi uniform on Kristallnacht.

The title partly refers to the Edmund Burke quote, ‘The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.’ And that’s essentially what Good is about. This is not just a film for those who want to understand how millions of Germans allowed the Nazis to get so far, but also for those who wonder whether the same thing could happen today. Indeed similar compromises are being made to a greater or lesser extent all over the world all the time. Thankfully though, most of these moral failures don’t lead to something like the Holocaust.

Sadly the only special features on the DVD are some okay interviews, but the film itself is well worth watching, for those who want something to think about.

Overall Verdict: Good may be imperfect, but as a study of moral choices but during the rise of Nazism and at any other time, it’s very interesting.

Special Features:
Interviews with Cast and Crew

Reviewer: Tim Isaac