February 19, 2026 – What appears to be a crazy homeless man enters a crowded diner and threatens everyone with explosives, but this man is not at all what he seems to be. If he is what he seems to be, it would at least make sense. The truth of his visit is far more strange, and funny.

Sam Rockwell stars as the stranger, a role for which he is well suited. He tells the shocked people in the diner that he is from the future, and that he is here to recruit a team of people to save the world from a terrible, dystopian future. Only two people volunteer for this fool's errand, Susan (played by Juno Temple of “Roofman”) and Ingrid (Haley Lu Richardson of “Love at First Sight”). Flashback scenes partially explain why they choose to join this adventure.

The rest of the team is coerced into joining, including teachers Mark (Michael Peñ of “Ant-Man”a) and Janet (Zazie Beetz of “Joker”) who have an even weirder back story. Also roped into this mission to save the future are Bob (Daniel Barnett of “The Mauritanian”) Scott (Asim Chaudhry of “Barbie”) and Marie (Georgia Goodman of “The Running Man”).

The diner is surrounded by police, who shoot first and ask questions later. Susan says she knows a secret way out of the diner. Even the stranger from the future doesn't know about this underground exit, despite the fact that he has been to this diner many times in his attempts to save the future. Susan doesn't explain how she knows about this secret exit.

The team is told that their mission is to stop the launch of a super intelligent computer program which will cause chaos and catastrophic levels of death. The man from the future has a flash drive containing safety programs which will, if inserted into the computer at the right time, prevent the A.I. program from causing the dystopian future. The dangerous A.I. program is being developed by a super intelligent nine-year-old boy in a nearby house.

The group must elude the police and numerous obstacles, including a giant cat, in order to reach the house, find the computer and load the safety program in the nick of time to prevent this dystopian future. Along the way, unexpected connections are revealed among the people on this incredible journey. The story is also about the blurred lines between reality and virtual reality, and about how people can be controlled by what they see and hear on their phones.

This is one of many movies that propose existential danger from artificial intelligence, but artificial intelligence can't create giant cats. The real danger comes from a few billionaires who have control over enough information delivery systems to influence enough people to control the country. This can be done through fear and the manipulation of preexisting prejudices. The goal is to generate fear against specific groups of people, to fear threats that are not real and to ignore threats that are real. We see this today in proposed laws that would take the right to vote away from millions of citizens to fix a supposed threat that doesn't exist. This is also evident in the federal government intentionally weakening its defenses against foreign interference in our election.

This movie is presented as a dark comedy with relatively few factual elements, warning us against against the threat of a giant cat and zombie-like teenagers. That's not the real threat, but it is an entertaining movie, thanks to some good performances, good special effects and a compelling story. The movie is ably directed by Gore Verbinski (“Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl”) and written by Matthew Robinson (“Love and Monsters”). This movie rates a B.

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