Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die (15)

At precisely 10.10pm, a shabbily dressed man a time traveller bursts into a busy Los Angeles diner and holds staff and customers hostage with a bomb strapped to his chest. As police cars with flashing lights swarm, the intruder explains that he needs to recruit a crack squad to save the world from a rogue artificial intelligence that will achieve consciousness that night. He has attempted this daredevil escapade 116 times before and must repeat his actions until he chances upon a solution.

LondonNet Film Review

Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die (15) Film Review from LondonNet

History repeats with calamitous and occasionally hilarious consequences in a blissfully bonkers sci-fi comedy, which consigns Sam Rockwell’s hapless time traveller to an Edge Of Tomorrow-style infinity loop until he can assemble a dream team capable of saving mankind from an emerging threat. Director Gore Verbinski, who captained the first three Pirates Of The Caribbean films, embraces the wild excesses of Matthew Robinson’s technology-averse script and pinballs between narrative arcs and timeframes with a fervour that serves to ramp up the discombobulation and delirium. Good luck, have fun, don’t lose the plot…

At precisely 10.10pm, a shabbily dressed man (Sam Rockwell), claiming to be a time traveller from the future, bursts into a busy Los Angeles diner and holds staff and customers hostage with a bomb strapped to his chest. As police cars with flashing lights swarm, the intruder explains that he needs to recruit a crack squad to save the world from a rogue artificial intelligence that will achieve consciousness that night. He has attempted this daredevil escapade 116 times before, with tragic outcomes, and must repeat his actions until he chances upon a perfect combination of courageous customers, who can pull together in outlandish adversity and snatch victory from the slavering jaws of defeat.

For his 117th suicide mission, the man selects Bob (Daniel Barnett), Marie (Georgia Goodman), teachers and co-workers Mark (Michael Pena) and Janet (Zazie Beetz), Scott (Asim Chaudhry), grief-stricken mother Susan (Juno Temple), and fairy tale princess party hostess Ingrid (Haley Lu Richardson), who suffers from a debilitating allergy to electronic devices and wifi. The motley crew of misfits navigates a haphazard night that the traveller has witnessed countless times before, but this time, something feels different…

Taking its title from words of encouragement uttered to the would-be heroes, Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die is a rip-roaring, high-concept caper that relishes the elasticity of time. Robinson’s screenplay bunny hops between flashbacks that fill in some of the characters’ sombre back stories and crudely determines chances of survival based on relative screen time. Verbinski’s directorial brio comes to the fore in action-orientated set pieces including a rooftop chase and a deadly game of hide and seek with masked assailants, but the film seesaws too sharply in the direction of stylised madness with some wild ejaculations of glitter in the closing 30 minutes.

Rockwell’s garrulous grandstanding elevates the film’s opening sequence inside the diner and convinces us to buckle up for an increasingly bumpy ride that taps into pressing concerns about social media, digital manipulation and virtual realities. The future is imperfect and that’s part of the fun.

– Sarah Lee