Directed by: Josh Safdie and Benny Safdie
Starring: Robert Pattinson, Benny Safdie, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Taliah Webster, Barkhad Abdi, Buddy Duress
Connie Nikas (Pattinson), the "hero" of Good Time, is one guy who should never have attempted a life of crime. He is spectacularly bad at it; the kind of guy who would pick a guy's pocket on an airplane and make a run for it. The only thing worse than botching the bank robbery is trying in vain to weasel his way out of trouble over the course of one long winter night. The opening scenes of Good Time are presented with a vibrant intensity and we wish the entire film was as watchable as the first half hour, but the film soon grows wearisome as we witness Connie foul one thing up after another. This is the stuff of comedy, but Good Time is a deadly serious film noir crime picture, with a digital score harkening back to those Tangerine Dream scores of the 1980s. The score can't be too good if you begin to notice it, the music should underline the scene and not take center stage.
Pattinson's performance is very good. He is a desperate loser hoping to steal a lot of money from a Queens bank in broad daylight with the unwitting help of his special needs brother Nick (Safdie), whom we are introduced to in the opening scenes undergoing a session with a therapist. We learn a lot about Nick in that scene, including his childhood of abuse and violence, but Connie soon barges in and steals him away to assist him in the ill-advised, ill-fated bank robbery. Al Pacino's Sonny in Dog Day Afternoon, which echoes throughout Good Time, would shake his head at some of Connie's moves. Connie seemingly learned how to be a bank robber while watching Dog Day Afternoon, which is not the place to learn. Dressed in bright high visibility vests and posing as black men (don't ask), Connie and Nick get away with the money and change clothes, but once the dye pack explodes all over them things start crumbling. The cops quickly locate them on the street and catch the slow-witted Nick, who winds up being pummeled in jail while Connie tries to scam his sometime girlfriend (Jason Leigh) into loaning him $10,000 for Nick's bail. Like everything else, it doesn't work out.
After hearing word that Nick was hospitalized following his jail fight, Nick hatches a plot to sneak his brother out of the hospital and hole up somewhere until he can figure his next move. That doesn't go as planned either, mostly because of a plot twist which doesn't ring true, but instead feels like a plot swerve. Connie is dumb and drugged up, but is that dumb and drugged up? Maybe, maybe not, but you begin to ask how he could have made the mistake he made instead of focusing on the long and winding plot. Good Time starts to unravel after that and soon becomes an exercise in delaying the inevitable ending as long as possible.
Pattinson is to be admired for taking on challenging roles which expand his acting range following the mainstream success of the Twilight series. In Good Time, he isn't likable and isn't supposed to be, but we are still carried along for a little while before the film loses steam. There are only so many different ways we can see one man screw up and try to rely on his lack of intellect and resourcefulness to fix them. Other characters being populating the film, including a 16-year old named Crystal who is the closest thing to a love interest for Connie, and Ray (Duress), who is as stupid as Connie, only without any real hope. Barkhad Abdi (Oscar nominee for Captain Phillips) shows up briefly as a security guard who thwarts another of Connie and Ray's schemes to find hidden money in an amusement park.
From the opening titles fresh out of 1970's action film to the over-the-top score, Good Time is an homage to films like Dog Day Afternoon, but without the media circus which served as a remarkable subplot in that film. Good Time takes place in the cold of night and in the shadows, but it doesn't bode well for the film when we wish Connie would get caught or turn himself in already.
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