Review #1,281: 'Good Time' (2017)

Whether he likes it or not - and I suspect the latter - Robert Pattinson will always be synonymous with Edward Cullen, the sullen and handsome vampire with impressive hair from the Twilight series. He caught many people's attention with his brief appearance in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, but Twilight turned him into a global star and the subject of much adoration from screaming teenage girls. It's an image few actors hoping to be taken seriously wishes to be lumped with throughout their entire career, and Pattinson has been making a noticeable effort to distant himself from the teen idol image ever since 2012's Breaking Dawn - Part 2 with the likes of Cosmopolis and The Rover. Yet despite Pattinson's commendable performances, neither were particularly brilliant films. However, his latest, Benny and Josh Safdie's Good Time, is very good indeed.

Taking inspiration from journey-into-night films like Martin Scorsese's After Hours and sharing the urgent pace of the techno-thrillers of the 1990s, Good Time is a huge explosion of energy. Taking place over the course of an eventful and increasingly weird 24 hours, we open not with Pattinson's petty criminal Connie Nikas, but his mentally handicapped brother Nick (co-director Benny Safdie). Nick is undergoing a psychiatric evaluation, but is quickly pulled out of it by Connie, who takes no time to convince his impressionable brother to help him rob a bank. In the grand tradition of movie heists, the robbery goes wrong when the bag of money explodes red dye all over the brothers. Nick is caught but Connie escapes, and the former is sent to Riker's Island. With a mixture of street-smarts and pure desperation, Connie sets out to raise the bail money, and later - after Nick is placed in hospital following a violent attack - to break his brother out.

Good Time is an experience best enjoyed by simply going with the flow. Like Connie, the film feels like it doesn't know where it's going, and that's part of the thrill. Connie proves himself skillful at talking his way out of the increasingly dangerous situations he finds himself in, but proves completely inept at decision-making. His journey takes him from borrowing money from his sort-of girlfriend (played by Jennifer Jason Leigh), to an encounter with a mother and daughter, and later to a fairground to retrieve a bottle of acid worth $10,000, where an honest security guard played by Barkhad Abdi awaits him. The story occasionally gets away from the Safdie brothers, but things are quickly helped back on track by some jet-black humour, impressive supporting performances from Buddy Duress and newcomer Taliah Webster, and, at its very centre, Robert Pattinson, who pulls you into wanting to see the night out with him despite his character's utter loathsomeness. The title is supposed to be ironic, but Good Time is one of the most enjoyable experiences I've had this year.


Directed by: Benny Safdie, Josh Safdie
Starring: Robert Pattinson, Benny Safdie, Taliah Webster, Buddy Duress, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Barkhad Abdi
Country: USA

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie