Good One writer-director India Donaldson looks back on taking her debut feature to Sundance and Cannes, conversations she wish she had when she was younger, and allowing parenthood to seep into her creative practice.
My favorite films are ones in which filmmakers trust their audience to form their own opinions about all aspects of the film, to have their own feelings about what is happening on the screen, and I really appreciate it when I see a wide range of emotional reactions and responses to a film.
—India DonaldsonTwo longtime friends decide to leave the troubles of big-city life behind, and embark on a three-day camping trip to the Catskill Mountains with their teenage kids. When one of the teens decides to stay home out of bitterness towards a lacking father, Sam (Lily Collias) finds herself all alone in the woods with two men (James Le Gros and Danny McCarthy) she believes to know well but will come to find out she might not know at all. India Donaldson’s quietly harrowing feature debut Good One juxtaposes the steady rhythms of nature and the all-but-steady tides of female adolescence to dissect a father-daughter relationship forever changed.
Playing both Sundance and Cannes, Good One ed a prestigious club earlier this year. Letterboxd have been greatly moved by the film throughout its festival run, with many seeing themselves reflected in Sam’s journey on-screen. “Finally, an accurate depiction of how annoying it is to be on your period in the woods,” points out Melanie, while Julie calls Good One “a very funny and easygoing hangout movie until it suddenly isn’t and starts hitting a little too close to home.”
Other have been quick to praise the film’s naturalistic, intimate feel, with Anna making a direct parallel with Kelly Reichardt’s Old Joy when calling Donaldson’s picture “an incisive and understated look at misogyny with strong performances and a quiet, naturalistic screenplay. The feeling is there, and this doesn’t overdo it—a rare gem in that respect.” Douglas labels it a “smart and assured” debut “that says as much about fatherhood, and the ways in which men struggle to confront even the most drastic of situations, as it does about the young women who bear the brunt of those situations. Lets you sit quietly for an hour; turns on its head with one question.”
As we take a seat by the French Riviera the day before Good One is set to play in Cannes, Donaldson (the daughter of veteran director Roger Donaldson) can’t quite believe her film is bringing up comparisons to the likes of Reichardt. “It is all a bit surreal still,” she says, although her beautifully tailored linen matching set and sunglasses make her feel right at home amongst the pruned French. We speak about making films later in life, how parenthood seeps into creativity, and conversations we wish we were more mature enough to have had when the moment asked for it. The filmmaker is as perceptive as her work, and as I leave her to her next conversation, I am already halfway into calling my dad.
Good One has such an effective grasp on the weight of suggestion, on how it can irreparably change the way we see others and the world around us. India Donaldson: There’s a quality to Sam that I wrote from a very personal place while reflecting on myself as a teenager, and all the ways in which I molded myself around the needs of others later in life. In my 20s and 30s, I started to notice this quality, which can be a nice thing, but was not always serving me. I wasn’t always listening to myself or my instincts—filmmaking is so much about listening to your instincts, while also being sensitive to the needs and ideas of your collaborators. I didn’t make a film of any kind until I was in my 30s. I had to have a handle on that idea that I could be true to myself, my own ideas and instincts, while also upholding the expectations of others.
The way I approach filmmaking is that no matter how autobiographical a subject is, it always comes from a personal place. It feels inherently vulnerable to make something, put it out into the world and let go. You can liken it to parenting in many ways: you can help a child find their way in the world in of how they relate to other people, but ultimately you can’t control it. There’s great vulnerability in that, but, to me, it’s an essential part of the process. I welcome it.
It’s so rare to have the right word or find the right thing to say at the moment. It’s only with reflection—and time, of course—that I’ve ever felt any sense of clarity. Some of the most meaningful conversations about hard moments that I’ve ever had have taken place weeks, months, years after the event.
—India DonaldsonThis is a story about intergenerational cycles, and I hear you became a parent while making it. How did your experience of parenthood affect the film?
I wrote the first draft of the script before having a child, put it away for a time, and then revisited it as a parent when my son was maybe four months old. That intense time of early parenthood changed my relationship with my own parents. It gave me a greater sense of empathy towards them, what their lives were as parents, and how being a parent affects and informs your creative life and your professional life.
When I revisited the script, I had a new sense of empathy for these two male characters I had written and really wanted to make sure that, even though the film is from Sam’s perspective, these men are complex, deep human beings. I wanted to do the best I could to make sure the audience had a particular experience of them. I have so much affection for the two of them, despite all of their flaws and the mistakes they’ve made, both in the past and within the film’s runtime. It comes back to empathy for me.
Empathy is another great word. There are moments when the father finds glimpses of empathy, but those aren’t necessarily when the daughter needs it most. How did you structure this seesawing between father and daughter in the script?
During the writing, then in the filming and editing, I was thinking about how often in familial relationships, when we’re out of step with each other, it’s so rare to have the right word or find the right thing to say at the moment. It’s only with reflection—and time, of course—that I’ve ever felt any sense of clarity. Some of the most meaningful conversations about hard moments that I’ve ever had have taken place weeks, months, years after the event.
Even after seeing the film, my dad and I had a really interesting conversation about our dynamic twenty years ago and how our relationship has evolved. This is a conversation that we never could have had in the moment when I was seventeen, full of feelings and not able to express any of these things. I had this feeling of being constantly out of step. Parents and children are always trying to catch up with each other or slow down to meet each other in the same place. God, how difficult it is to meet each other where you both are.
The film can be very subtle and quiet but, at the same time, it’s very primal: from clothes stained with sweat to a girl handling the messiness of menstruation in the woods. How important was this balance?
When I think about the films I love, I’m always drawn in by films that effectively show the little details, the small moving parts of the emotional journey of whatever the subject matter is. These little details are vital to the emotional arc of the story. In Kelly Reichardt’s Meek’s Cutoff, for example, you really get a sense of what it is like to be under the harsh sun, to be covered by sweat and dirt, the process of collecting water from a stream… You can feel these things, in real time. I was greatly inspired by that.
It’s important to create a meaningful portrait of what it feels like to be in those woods for three days on end. There are moments in the film when you have a scene where they are just naming foods they are fantasizing about eating. This is an encapsulation of what it feels like when you have so much time at hand to let your thoughts spin out and every small detail about every small little thing becomes very meaningful.
Sometimes, when a film is more subdued, audiences can project their understanding of it much more than if everything were given to them. How was it for you, creatively, to deal with the audience’s reception and their projections of the film?
To be honest, that’s exactly what I wanted. It goes back to my initial parenting analogy and letting go of control. My favorite films are ones in which filmmakers trust their audience to form their own opinions about all aspects of the film, to have their own feelings about what is happening on the screen, and I really appreciate it when I see a wide range of emotional reactions and responses to a film. I know not everyone is going to find this open-endedness satisfying, but I hope some people do. You don’t need to please everybody.
‘Good One’ releases in select US theaters August 9 via Metrograph Pictures.
