Directed by Gore Verbinski
Written by Matthew Robinson
Just about every year there is at least one movie, sometimes more, where the cast and filmmaker seem too good to be true for something you’ve never heard of, not really seen any marketing for, and gets dumped into a random month on a limited number of screens across the country. Well, we’re only a month into 2026, and Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die is already one of those movies. It features a cast that includes such names as Academy Award winner Sam Rockwell (Three Billboards), Juno Temple (Ted Lasso), Michael Pena (Ant-Man), Zazie Beetz (Joker), and Haley Lu Richardson (The White Lotus). And the film’s director is Gore Verbinski, whose CV includes such hits as Pirates of the Caribbean and The Ring. There are often good reasons why these movies exist, and why you’ve never heard of them. The reasons are rarely good. It is often emblematic of a project with ambition that looked really good on paper to attract the talent, but somewhere along the line failed to garner the necessary budget or execution to deliver a well-received commercial hit in the end. Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die certainly falls into some of those categories, but it manages to be its very own unique self along the way.
A random group of people are gathered at Hank’s Diner to enjoy first dates, group outings, or that much needed alone time with a slice of pie when a ragged man (Sam Rockwell) comes in claiming to be a time-travelling hero from the future whose mission is to recruit a team of people who can help him save the world. Among those who or are voluntold to help are teachers (Zazie Beetz and Michael Pena) who struggle with their technology addicted students, a sad looking princess (Haley Lu Richardson) who claims to be allergic to technology, and a mother (Juno Temple) whose son died in a school shooting, but has been cloned, along with many others, as society has been desensitized from so many school shootings. The rag-tag team’s first step is to make it out of the restaurant which has been surrounded by police thanks to the strange man’s appearance and presence. From there, who knows, as past attempts have not proven to be very successful to date.
Taking inspiration from many properties before it, Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die is chock full of ambition, mostly stemming from the screenplay by Matthew Robinson. Robinson’s ideas are broad and big, taking direct aim at humanity’s growing dependence on technology, the scary prospect of a world built by AI, and people’s loss of humanity as a result. Certainly timely in its message and themes, the film makes no attempt to hide its point behind allegory or symbolism. For some this might be a refreshing approach, but I often fail to fully appreciate such an approach where the message is clear, obvious and right on the film’s sleeve, with very little left up for interpretation. It doesn’t make the message any less poignant, timely or important. Nor does it mean that I disagree with it, but it does take away from my enjoyment of the film on an artistic merit level.
The style of the film appears unique on the surface, as there are not many movies quite like this. But the ones that are (think Everything Everywhere All at Once) are quite obvious, making the aesthetic and approach less than original. Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die does have the benefit of a great cast who is dedicated to their craft in this film. Each gives a very committed performance, especially Sam Rockwell who gives his all anytime he is on screen, even in these smaller, more zany movies (of which he makes tons). I’m also a big fan of Haley Lu Richardson and what she brings to a movie anytime I see her in one. Perhaps slightly lesser known and without the bigger credits of some of her castmates, Richardson is still magnetic on screen. Lastly, Juno Temple seems appropriately perturbed by everything going on around her. Across the board, the cast manages to succeed to create an great ensemble, even if individuals are ultimately not given nearly enough to do apart from Rockwell (Pena and Beetz for instance).
Saying that there are worse ways to spend a couple hours is a very backhanded compliment, but it might be the best I can do for a film like Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die, whose premise and style both seem to be as unoriginal as they are impactful and important in our current time. I’m as worried about what technology is doing to us as a society as the next guy, and I enjoy a strange, zany sci-fi ride as well. But with little to no subtlety built into the delivery, and bringing no real innovation to the genre, I can’t recommend this film to anyone not already interested in its contents. It doesn’t transcend as EEAAO did. But I can’t dismiss it outright either, leaving it somewhere in the range of “there are worse ways to spend a couple of hours”.
Corndog Chats 