Good Grief review – Dan Levy’s satisfyingly grown-up drama

The Schitt’s Creek co-creator stars in his directorial debut – a crisp, bittersweet tale of loss and friendship

The directorial debut of Dan Levy, the Emmy award-winning co-creator and co-star of Schitt’s Creek, Good Grief looks so glossily moneyed and impossibly handsome that you naturally assume that it’s going to be shallow and rather dumb. But Levy, who also wrote the screenplay and stars in the picture, has made a satisfyingly adult, bittersweet drama which argues that even a seemingly gilded life can be painfully messy.

Levy plays Marc, a London-based illustrator who is devastated when his wealthy, charismatic husband, Oliver (Luke Evans), dies unexpectedly. But as he works through his grief, Marc discovers a secret that leads him to question how well he knew the man he has been mourning. With his two best friends Sophie (Ruth Negga) and Thomas (Himesh Patel) in tow, Marc heads to Paris to look for closure (and a side order of elegantly understated fashion shopping). What elevates the picture is the crisp dialogue, which captures bonds of friendship that are loving, but at the same time stretched to breaking point.

On Netflix