Sam (Lily Collias) is a teenage girl trapped in the woods with two men.
Not in a slasher or action movie kind of way. In “Good One,” she is stuck with her dad (James LeGros) and his friend (Danny McCarthy) on a camping trip as the two men bond, bicker, posture and melt down a bit.
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Navigating this weekend and her role in the adult world, Sam is more self-aware and observant — and often smarter — than the grown-ups who are nominally in charge. That doesn’t make her sense of isolation any easier, but it creates a poignant and quietly powerful film in writer-director India Donaldson’s feature debut.
Donaldson’s father, Roger Donaldson, is a director (“No Way Out,” “Thirteen Days”) and she grew up immersed in that world before deciding she needed her own identity, embarking on a career in textiles. But she eventually got pulled back in, and after some short films wrote “Good One” during the pandemic.
The film was originally set in the Sierra Nevadas, where Donaldson, who grew up in California, has long hiked, but for practical reasons (budget and crew) she moved it to New York and the Catskills, which created an even more intimate setting. That was important because it’s a major character in a three-person movie.
“I was always thinking about how we were framing the natural world and where they were in relationship to it,” Donaldson says. “I never wanted to present this kind of overly romantic perspective on nature. I wanted the natural environment that they’re passing through as this kind of neutral observer of their dynamics being played out.”
Casting the Catskills was easy, but Donaldson was having trouble finding her lead until her younger sister Octavia introduced her to a friend Lily, then a high school junior. Donaldson was won over in their first meeting. The film was shot in 12 days, almost entirely out in nature. The result was a critical hit at Sundance this year.
Donaldson and Collias recently spoke by video about their experiences. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Q. India, you said this was inspired by trips with your dad.
Donaldson: Some were road trips. With both, there’s a freedom and an openness, but a claustrophobia too as a teenager because there’s no out. We drove from California to New York when I went to college and it was the most profound, but also deeply claustrophobic and frustrating, ten days of my life and for his life as well. Even with camping, you think it’s going to bring this expansive experience but the opposite might be true.
Q. Then you go into your tent at night and you’re trapped.
Donaldson: It’s the smallest space you’re ever going to share with your father. And I wrote this during the pandemic, so I was reflecting on these themes of isolation and connection.
Q. Speaking of camping, how did you deal with nature on such a brief shoot and did it influence the film?
Donaldson: The environment changed it fundamentally. It rooted us in the specificity of the moment, with the weather, the flora and fauna while we were there. The mountain laurel only blooms for two weeks but it was blooming while we were there. One of my favorite moments was when Lily sees a slug and points it out — that’s not in the script, that slug just happened to be slugging by, and it became a character in the movie.
My dad told me, “Whatever happens with the weather, just write it into the story. Keep shooting.” We had to pause because of lightning one day but otherwise, we just tried to barrel through and adapt, which can bring happy accidents.
Collias: The day of the lightning we were on a porch and just decided to set up the tent and film interior shots.
Donaldson: That wasn’t in the script, but we thought, “How can we use this time?”
Collias: And that actually made it into the final cut, which is also pretty cool.
Q. There are a lot of silences, where the emotions of a scene only play out on Sam’s face. Was that tricky to capture?
Donaldson: Lily has so much happening behind her eyes and in her brain. She was just so authentic and complex and layered in her performance. We never had a lot of time; we never could do more than three takes. My rule was if we have Lily’s coverage of a scene – even if she’s listening, not talking – then we have the scene.
Collias: I was just surrounding myself in the environment around me, understanding that although most of the conversations are between the two men, that she is very much present in those moments and the camera is very much catered towards her. I really felt comfortable to push myself and let things out, even if it’s just a simple facial expression.
Q. Could you relate to what Sam was going through?
Collias: I am also a teenage girl with a dad, so I understand the complexity of that relationship and how they show attention towards you and how you try to gain attention from them. But I guess what really stood out was just how intuitive she was and how clever she was.
Q. India, you’ve said you’d love for teens to watch this movie, but wouldn’t it be better if middle-aged men watch it?
Donaldson: You’re so right. That hit me after we screened it at Sundance, and a number of men with adult children came up to me afterwards to talk.
Collias: I watched this with my dad at the Sundance premiere. It was a really intimate experience and there was this moment where I’m crying and I turned to my dad and I saw him getting emotional and I don’t really see him get emotional like that. And he said, “I don’t think I’ll ever get comfortable with seeing my daughter cry.” It was a bittersweet and beautiful moment.
Hopefully, people can see it and sit with it for a moment and have a conversation about it.
Q. Maybe everybody should take their dads to go see it.
Collias: That’s what I think too.
