By Nick Nitkowski 

Can you believe that it’s already been almost exactly nine years since Gore Verbinski released a movie in theaters? Most famously known for directing the first three “Pirates of the Caribbean” movies, the last movie he made was “A Cure for Wellness” which was released back in February of 2017 to mixed reviews. Since then, Gore Verbinski had vanished from the director’s chair with no sign of returning. Until now, that is! Gore Verbinski is back with a whole new film with a very unique title: “Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die”. After seeing the trailer for it, I knew I wanted to see this movie, and, with a stroke of Good Luck, I had the opportunity to see it early. Now that I have seen it, did I actually Have Fun? Or is this movie dead on arrival?

The movie stars Sam Rockwell as a supposed time traveler who makes his way into a local restaurant full of patrons announcing that the end of the world is nigh due to the growth of A.I. technology and needs the assistance of a specific collection of patrons to help him stop the technological apocalypse from occurring and save humanity. As he gathers his collection of volunteers, they set forth into the crazy unknown in the attempts to save the world.

Well, as you can probably deduce from the title, I had a lot of fun with this movie! This movie was an absolute wild ride with so many crazy things happening, some of which made me stare at the screen wide-eyed in a good way. This movie had me laughing, and even had me shocked as they addressed certain real-world topics. What I liked most about this movie is that it basically calls out the absurdity of our modern-day culture and addiction to technology in an unapologetic way that made me think to myself, “Yep, this is definitely the direction we’re heading in.” The movie did not shy away from what it wanted to do, and I applaud it for being that bold and unapologetic. You don’t see many movies willing to take that kind of risk these days.

Sam Rockwell was great as the leader of this unlikely group of people into the fray. He provided most of the spoken comedy of the film, which he’s always been great at doing. We also have Michael Pena and Zazie Beetz as a dysfunctional couple, and I thought they both did very well together. We also have Juno Temple as someone who’s dealing with grief, and he was good. We also have a few assorted characters who all played their part well in this story.

Overall, I thought that “Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die” was a great movie and a welcome return for director Gore Verbinski. It has laughs, it has intrigue, it’s disturbing and uncomfortable, and it has some WTF moments all wrapped up in a crazy sci-fi, modern dystopian future misadventure. I enjoyed it immensely and really hope that audiences seek it out. I didn’t need Good Luck with this movie because I did Have Fun with it and I really think that people, at least those who Don’t Die when they put their phones away for a couple hours, will feel the same way when they see this on the big screen that rivals that of a phone.

4.5 stars