- Directed by Gore Verbinski
- September 24, 2025 (Fantastic Fest) / February 13, 2026 (US)
A man from the future travels to the past to recruit patrons from an LA diner to stop a rogue artificial intelligence.
Not exactly sure what I expected with Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die but it becomes clear in the first few seconds that this is going to be a critique of social media, AI, and modern society all-in-one filled with people who probably shouldn’t be saving the world but being a comedy are all that that there is available. Almost cliché there.
Those targets are set in a story that ultimately is about unresolved mommy issues. For the most part it’s entertaining and weird. I’ve heard this called a ‘comedy’ and I guess it rates as one, but I miss the days when a comedy had clear jokes rather than being simply quirky.
Maybe it is me and all the movies I have seen but one question that seems unasked is: isn’t this all taking place in the virtual reality/AI world Man From the Future (Sam Rockwell) is trying to fight? Think about it for a moment. Think of all the strange stuff that happens without some explanation that defies basic reality. I am not talking the assorted weirdos they meet but for example that weird cat thing we see.
Even in a world with the conceit of time travel, some things are still off the table. Such a realization would’ve been a very ‘70s defeatist science fiction ending and made something that was strange and lighthearted very downbeat. It makes much more sense than traveling 117 times into the past to change history and never succeeding with no indications of help or of things that defy ANY reality.
I appreciate that director Gore Verbinski doesn’t directly answer everything but throws enough that you can create head cannon (mostly) around where it points towards. I can’t say I hated it though. At least not entirely. There is enough to make you smile and the twist involving the character of Ingrid (Haley Lu Richardson) was genuinely unexpected yet very logical when you saw everything laid out.
We get quite a talented cast, though these are actors who are talented and popular at this moment. Michael Peña as Mark, Zazie Beetz as Janet, and even to an extent Juno Temple as Susan are all the cool kids of the moment. Nothing against them. Rockwell gives depth to a man out of his time and as the story goes on adds layers with his character revealing more and more. When the true nature of his quest is revealed at the end, it all becomes heartbreaking in retrospect. For a movie that engages in a great deal of absurdity there’s a level of pathos that I did not expect.
You can look at this and see it draws in elements of The Matrix and Terminator with enough superficial changes that it will avoid a lawsuit. It puts them into a shake ‘n bake bag and comes out with a different enough film.
This just isn’t a movie for everybody. It’s a very niche film and that’s fine. Every movie should be accessible to everybody, but maybe not for everybody. It owns what it is. and doesn’t shy away from that. It maintains a unique style and presentation from start to finish.
There is no pretense of mainstream appeal making the film a bit over budgeted/over produced. It has to grand of aims for what it is. I think Verbinski assumed he might be enough to pull in an audience. Either that or the word “No” was never uttered in his direction.
I enjoyed Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die. I had questions but nothing that took away from my experience. If I had changed anything it would have been to focus on the characters over social targets. Maybe a scene in the future (or even one more flashback) to make it clear that it was either all futile or a difficult thing to get right. The science as it were.
Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die is not a bad experience but one for a narrower audience. I really wished it had made a few things clearer.
