Good Time-Benny & Josh Safdie

Years ago I would have watched this movie by the Safdie brothers and probably lied to myself thinking that I had just been privileged to witness cinematic brilliance.

But after completing it on a whim the other night, I felt it was nothing more than an exceptional score with an outlandish plot of goofy characters playing inconceivable cat and mouse games with various authority figures.

The plot starts off with Nick (Benny Safdie) being given cognitive tests by a doctor. The questions become increasingly difficult and Benny begins to clam up and shed tears when an abusive episode of the past involving his Grandmother begins to reveal itself.

Before we find out all that had happened, in bursts Nick's brother, Connie (Robert Pattinson). Maniacally he yanks Nick from the session and out of the office, kissing and hugging his mentally challenged brother along the way, telling him he doesn't need doctors or professional help. Only family.

Without explanation, the next scene begins with the two of them donning ridiculous looking masks inside of a bank where they hand the teller a note demanding $65,000 in cash. She fills it with whats in the drawer. Unsatisfied with the amount, Connie underlines the part in the note which says that they are armed. The teller goes back into the vault (midday, mind you) while Connie tries to calm down his nervous brother and then she reappears with fresh bundles.

They leave casually, remove the masks and clothing in an alley about a block away and celebrate their successful acquisition of opulence.

Shortly thereafter they get a ride and a dye pack explodes in the car. The car crashes and they flee on foot into the bathroom of a Domino's where they clean up and stash the money in the ceiling. Afterwards they separate and Nick ends up getting caught by the police.

Later on Connie retrieves the money (half of which is ruined) to put up bail money for his brother. The bail bondsman informs him that he's $10,000 short and even after he convinces his girlfriend to put up the deficit, her card is declined.

The movie then cuts to a scene at Rikers Island, where Nick somehow has already landed (instead of in the tombs) and gets into an argument with other prisoners over the television set and ends up getting the shit kicked out of him.

Once this information is revealed to Connie he decides to find out the hospital Nick is located at and refocuses his addled mission to liberating his brother from intensive care. He gets there and manages to break free some sedated person (under police surveillance) bandaged all around the face and hitches a ride on the hospital bus all while eluding the police.

He gets in good with one of the other passengers and shows up at their doorstep later on and they let him in because it is cold outside. Connie ends up becoming friends with the occupants 16 year old daughter and has a make out session with her to distract her from his mugshot on the news. In another room, the person Connie sprung from the hospital wakes up and it turns out that it isn't Nick, but some whacked out junky named Ray who had leaped out of a cab when it was going around 50 MPH.

Connie somehow manages to convince the girl to give him the family car and they all head back to the hospital. While waiting for food at White Castle, Ray goes deeper into his tale about how he and some friends had to ditch a bottle of high grade acid and a bag full of cash inside of an amusement park while eluding the cops. Connie sees this as an opportunity to get the necessary funds to bail out his brother and detours the car over to the amusement park. They sneak inside, find the acid, but not the cash. The night shift security guard nabs Ray, but Connie knocks him out and they convince the cops that arrive that the security guard was the trespasser and take his ID and keys and head over to his apartment. A dealer friend of Ray's, Caliph (Necro), shows up and they try to negotiate a sale for the bottle of acid. He leaves. Ray drinks. Connie moralizes, degrades, and insults him and the cops show up again. This time catching Connie while Ray falls off the balcony and die's. All that we find out about Nick is that he is in good hands in a hospital, learning to acclimate to his mental deficiency.

I'm not one to be a plot hole Gestapo, but so much of this story didn't make any sense.

Why was Connie so intent on removing Nick from professional care? What desperate measure forced them into robbing a bank?

*I know you have to be completely stupid to rob a bank in modern times, but who takes an autistic person on a heist?*

What would Connie do after he bailed out Nick from either jail or the hospital? What kind of demented timeline affords a person the hours to free someone from hospital custody, rob a bank, flee from the police, stash money, visit a bail bondsman, bust out a stranger from a hospital, crash a different stranger for shelter, borrow their car, go on a treasure hunt, free a cohort from security guard custody, beat up the security guard, and then negotiate a drug deal all within the time span of 24 hours? That's quite a lot of activity to consume one day.

The motivational aims were so incredibly desultory and the demands of suspending realism way too much to ask for in this flick. Which is pretty surprising, considering that Uncut Gems was a fairly decent film. But in Good Times the train of lunacy skittled so far off the track that, after the hospital scene, I just gave up on any sense of realism. I know the fact that Connie dyes his hair blonde is supposed to conceal his identity, but enough to keep him from being recognized at the hospital or at the amusement park?

Whatever.

Decent synth-heavy score, not half-bad acting efforts across the board, but not enough to make up for the rest of this mess to salvage a decent watch.

I agree with the sentiment that I believe the Safdie's were attempting to imply; that repeat offenders have only one destination: prison. But this trip was a bit far-fetched to drive home that point. And no one ex-felon (who is living in the immediate aftermath existence of robbing a bank) would ever moralize to another comrade in hard time that he is a leech to society. I've known and met plenty of these types in my life, and their persistent residence outside of the law and behind bars only serves to strengthen their bond, not drive them apart. (Peep the book You Can't Win-Jack Black to understand fully what I mean by this).

Peace to Necro, but this shit was garbage.

Stars: *

Verdict: Pass

Cousins: Uncut Gems, Love Lies Bleeding, Drive, Taxi Driver, Rain Man