Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: a man is sent back in time to present-day LA to prevent a sentient AI from taking over the world and ushering in the apocalypse. This is not only the plot of the better part of the Terminator franchise but also the simplest description of the new Gore Verbinski film Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die starring Sam Rockwell. However, to suggest the latter film is just a rip off of the former would miss much of the gore, fun and at moments darkly hilarious content of Verbinski’s new offering.
Other than the initial premise Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die has very little in common with Cameron’s Terminator and instead follows The man from the Future (Rockwell’s character) as he gathers a rag tag group from a diner called Norms who travel across LA in an effort to put in safe guards against the sentient AI which will come into existence that night. It quickly becomes clear however that this is not the man from the future’s first attempt and the repeated failures have led to him watching almost everyone in the diner die more than once often in horrible ways, sort of like if Groundhog Day was inhabited by Rambo and not a snarky Bill Murray, the film obviously owes much of its time travel conceit to Groundhog Day and very clearly lampshades the famous diner scene from that movie as well. As well as the attempt to reach the AI, we also see how the various members of the group ended up in the diner that night in their own separate vignettes, which vary in quality from passable to incredibly enjoyable.
Rockwell is on classic form here as a menacing and more than slightly unhinged character who also has his moments of charm (see the criminally underrated Mr Nice Guy), which is doubly impressive when much of the early part of the film is spent with the audience and the other characters believing he has a bomb strapped to his chest. The rest of the main cast also does a serviceable job here in the group sections particularly when they get to play off each other and Rockwell, particular mention should go to Juno Temple who probably delivers the best performance of the film, especially in her own vignette which was the absolute highlight of the film and managed to go from an unexpectedly sombre moment to pitch-black comedy all centred around a school shooting, to say anymore would ruin the fun but I promise the section is way funnier than that sentence sounds.
There are slight missteps to be found throughout the film though, Verbinski’s direction with a couple of stand-out exceptions and some good comedic timing tends to be far more functional than particularly notable and the casting of Assim Choudry seems like a bizarre choice particularly as he fails to reach the american accent he’s going for leading to his performance feeling far lesser than the rest of the main cast. The film clearly knows what it wants to say about our reliance on technology and the rise of AI, but it isn’t quite clever enough to stick the landing and leans on an occasional preachiness about the issue rather than having something new to say.
In conclusion, there is a lot to love about Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die from the campy over the top action to some genuinely imaginative and enjoyable set pieces, but it doesn’t quite hit the punch when most needed and as a result is left lacking. Audiences looking for commentary on creeping AI and the existential dread that being on the internet provides, perhaps won’t find it here, but if you ever wondered what Black Mirror would look like if written by the South Park guys, then this is a good time.
