Sundance Review: The Good Night

January 30, 2007
by Alex Billington

My interest in The Good Night comes purely from the cast, of which I love Martin Freeman and Simon Pegg, and the interesting plot. Written and directed by Jake Paltrow, brother of the film's star Gwyneth Paltrow, The Good Night is about former pop star Gary (Freeman), who starts having dreams about a perfect girl (Penélope Cruz) when the relationship with his wife (Paltrow) begins to lose its pleasure. Gary then attempts to learn about lucid dreaming in order to hold onto that dream longer and finally discovers she is a real life person and pursues her love. Unfortunately The Good Night is vastly underwhelming in its attempt to be profound and a rather poor film from Jake Paltrow.

The Good Night has a number of issues, the biggest of which is that it doesn't have a really well-defined narrative structure. The film is just a long build up into nothing. It does have a very dreamy and powerful score - but that's the only notable achievement as thus. And although Martin Freeman is charming, the highlight of The Good Night is actually Simon Pegg, who steals every last scene. If it weren't for Pegg and the score, The Good Night would be much worse off than it currently is. This film needs to head back to the editing room for a couple more months of work, if that will even help, in order to get it back on the right track.

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