The Good Girl

Justine Last is a thirty-year-old clerk at a discount store in a small Texas town, worn down by a dull job and a marriage that has settled into routine. Her husband Phil is affectionate but spends much of his time smoking marijuana with his friend Bubba, and the couple have been unable to have a child. Justine finds a kindred spirit in a younger co-worker, Holden Worther, an aspiring writer who models himself on Holden Caulfield from The Catcher in the Rye. What begins as an escape from her unhappiness turns into an affair, and then into something more consuming and harder to control.

The Good Girl was released in 2002 and runs 93 minutes. Miguel Arteta directed from a screenplay by Mike White, with Matthew Greenfield producing. Jennifer Aniston plays Justine, Jake Gyllenhaal plays Holden, and the cast also includes John C. Reilly as Phil, Tim Blake Nelson as Bubba, Zooey Deschanel as Cheryl and John Carroll Lynch as the store manager. It was Arteta's first feature in the directing filmography listed here, ahead of Youth in Revolt, Cedar Rapids and later titles.

Made for about 8 million dollars, the film took roughly 17 million worldwide. On TMDB it holds a 6.2 rating from around 700 votes, a modest figure that suggests a mixed response from viewers rather than broad enthusiasm. The production was an international one, credited to companies in the United States, Germany and the Netherlands.