Review of Lucky You

Lucky You (2007)
3/10
Lucky Who?
11 May 2007
This is one of those movies where the only story that you would really care about is in the trailers.

I didn't know about the movie being held by the studios for a couple of years and whatever studio politics was involved in that decision. I would imagine that it was a case of several people not wanting this thing released with their name on it. It seems then that they took any interesting moments available in the entire film and made them into the trailer. I wonder if they had to go back and shoot more scenes just to be able to get footage for the trailer.

I left the film thinking that it was some sort of Gamblers Anonymous PSA gone wrong. We see what a gambling addiction will do to people throughout the film, just how screwed up some of these people are, but it's all done as a funny aside. Sort of a "oh, look at the cute alcoholic, he can't stand up." We have men getting breast implants on a bet. Yes, I know a real guy did it but that doesn't make it sane or interesting. The same character takes a bet to live in a casino men's room for a month? Huck (is that short for huckster? surely no one would name their kid Huckleberry), our lead, is so consumed by his addiction that he begs, borrows, and steals from everyone he meets. He lives alone and sleeps on a lawn chair by his empty pool. He's sold off all of his furniture (except presumably for his bed) and mortgaged the family home to the hilt. Wait, maybe that's just the American Dream updated for the '00s. No, he's cool, he's a gambler. I can see countless addicts pointing their family to this film to justify just one more mortgage so they can make it all back and live happily ever after. Vegas is counting on you baby.

I'd also like to know how this degenerate gambler manages to park his bike in the underground garage at Bellagio? Then he proceeds to wander through the back halls and service areas of one of the world's largest casinos. Yeah, right. Maybe he's trying for a part in Ocean's 23.

I know that the actors are better than this and they all have shown it across decades of fine work. How in the world does something like this movie get made and who didn't have the chips to keep this thing on the shelf where it belonged?
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