Artificial Intelligence, despite the overwhelming pushback to not integrate it into everyday life, has certainly changed the world. The film, Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die, explores the dark side of AI.
Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die follows a group of chosen individuals, led by a man from the future, to stop the launch of artificial intelligence. Using an anthological format, the film also explores how notable characters, like the teacher duo of Mark and Janet and the desperate Susan, influence present events.
Facing dangers like mind-controlled students and bizarre AI creations, this film happily embraces the darkly comedic side of things.
Given how wild Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die gets, there are certain elements that should be recognized that were teased previously. I had the chance to talk with director Gore Verbinski about the film’s side-by-side development with AI, an important opening sequence, and more.
Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die first began production in 2024, when generative AI wasn’t quite as advanced as it is now. As such, Verbinski sought to anticipate how its usage then would affect how it was viewed in the film.
“[Back] then, it was still on the horizon,” Verbinski began. “It’s becoming more and more part of everyday life. So it was important to work on the screenplay and try to future-proof it as best we could.
Additionally, Verbinski pointed out that the film’s AI threat was more focused on controlling rather than killing. “A lot of that had to do with creating this antagonist who is not some Skynet killing machine; it’s much worse.”
“It wants us to like it, right?” Verbinski said. “It wants to keep us engaged. It’s interesting, even being in meetings on gaming, there’s the intention to make a crack, right? It’s like, ‘We want to keep you engaged.'”
The way that Verbinski nails this idea home is through an opening monologue that Sam Rockwell’s character gives. This monologue, which was first drafted by writer Matthew Robinson, was originally eleven pages long and had much more to discuss on AI’s hook.
During our conversation, Verbinski went into more detail about how he worked with Rockwell to make this monologue more compelling.
“We shoot takes, and we put the best ones together,” Verbinski noted. “I think the trick with something like that is [that] you’re getting into sort of intention versus discovery.”
“For me, I have to approach it with a tremendous amount of intent so that mediocrity is always nipping at your heels if you’re not trying to be inventive, thinking about your shot construct and the hidden musicality of things and storyboarding it and all of that.”
However, Verbinski also noted that the intention for Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die‘s opening sequence is designed in a way that feels fluid in a way that will keep audiences hooked for those first few minutes.
“You want to have all of that intention, but you also want to say, ‘We’re going to design it so that he can do what he does so well and surprise us,'” Verbinski explained. “The most important thing was tempo and to make it feel like this is occurring in one instance.”
Although this sequence in the film is one of the more heavy-handed aspects of the film, the visual effects truly reflect the craziness of generative AI that we still feel today. However, there’s one element that’s very reminiscent of a part of one memorable Verbinski movie.
In the trailer for Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die, one of the scenes sees a huge tornado of wires and machinery being formed inside this chamber in front of Haley Lu Richardson’s Ingrid. For some, it may be similar to the giant maelstrom in the climax of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End.
Given how Verbinski directed both movies, he described the differences and production challenges when it came to developing these respective effects.
“I think water is always trickier; we still are not great at CG water,” Verbinski explained. “It’s the transition from the mask to the foam, to the mist. You can always look at CG water, and you sense that there’s three passes stitched together.”
“The computer is not really able to kind of do all those things at once. So, you get that stitchery between those three elements. I think with cables, we tried to kind of keep it as lo-fi as we could.”
Verbinski referred to another film that served as inspiration for this particular effect in Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die. “There was a great movie: Tetsuo: The Iron Man,” Verbinski said.
“It’s all stop motion with wires. Beautiful, beautiful film. It was important to kind of keep that stuff clicky and feeling almost like it’s stop motion!”
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Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die releases in theaters on Friday, February 13.
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Chris Gallardo
Christopher Gallardo is an entertainment writer, critic, and member of New York Film Critics Online. While not running his own social channels, Chris can be found writing reviews and breakdowns on all things films and TV for multiple outlets. Plus, he loves Percy Jackson, animated films and shows, and Fallout! You can find him anywhere on social media at @chrisagwrites.