In Good Company
For the premier magazine Sports America, loyalty is key. With Dan Foreman's veteran sales team, the magazine has reached new heights to become the flagship of the company. However, on this day, the big fish becomes a small fish in a big pond. Its parent company is taken over by Globecom, a media conglomerate, and with it comes new management. Foreman (Dennis Quaid) sees himself demoted as a hotshot businessman Carter Duryea (Topher Grace) with little sales experience becomes the boss. It sets off a series of events where both of their lives take a turn for the worse. Foreman deals with the news that his wife is pregnant with their third child and a second mortgage is needed to pay off the bills. Duryea has to go through a divorce. But one man's loss (Foreman sees his daughter Alex, played by Scarlett Johansson, transfer to New York University) is another man's gain (Alex and Carter become a couple).

In Good Company is simply a nice film to watch. I'm always a sucker for productions in a corporate environment (think The Office, Sports Night, Office Space, etc.) and this one doesn't disappoint. It has a right touch of comedy and romance that many will enjoy. You certainly feel for Quaid's character, who gets demoted for someone half his age and suddenly money becomes a problem with his daughter getting into NYU and another baby on the way. The romance between Grace and Johannson was done well by both but has a fleeting feeling to it and part of the problem there might be because writer and director Paul Weitz moves through each of the scenes fairly quickly. While 8+ months pass through the film, these events could have happened within a few days and no one would have been the wiser except for the fact that Dan's wife delivers her baby. A slower movie that emphasized further the strong scenes the couple had as well as a few scenes showing the office (which seems to disappear in the middle of the film) and the struggles Carter experienced there would have made the film great. Right now, it's just good. 3 stars