Reviewed
by Lamar Kukuk
5/6/07
I've
never been to Las Vegas, and can't say I've ever felt a strong desire to
go. Sure, I bet it's cool to stand in the street surrounded by all
those lights, and some of the shows sound like an interesting stop as part
of a better trip, but at the end of the day all that stuff sounds a lot
like coating cigarettes in chocolate. I doubt there's anything fun
you can do in Vegas that you couldn't do someplace else that isn't working
so hard to ruin your life while you're there. This view is only re-enforced
by Curtis Hanson's Lucky You, a movie about the World Series of
Poker that makes the event seem to occur someplace just south of Hell.
Huck
Cheever (Eric Bana) calls himself a professional poker player, but he's
really a professional loser. He's always in search of money to gamble,
and always looking for a way to lose anything he happens to win.
Huck's father is a legend: L.C. Cheever (Robert Duvall) has won the
World Series of Poker twice and taught his son how to play just well enough
to never beat his Dad. L.C. left Huck and his Mom when he was young,
and now pretty much everything the kid does is about taking out that anger.
Even when he meets idealistic lounge singer Billie (Drew Barrymore), he
only knows how to express his affection by stealing her money. Huck
needs ten thousand dollars to get himself into the World Series, and after
many misadventures gets the cash from shady Roy Durucher (Charles Martin
Smith). Will winning the event finally get Huck on his feet, or will
it cost him his last chance at happiness?
Warner
Bros. has delayed the release of Lucky You several times, and it's
not hard to see why they'd find it a tough sell. The movie demands
that you have enough interest in poker to follow lengthy, detailed games,
but at the same time takes a very negative view of the gambling lifestyle.
For me, though, this juxtaposition made the on-screen poker exciting in
a way more conventional “root for the heroes” games in movies like Maverick
and Rounders never were. Because I wasn't sure who or what
to root for, there's an extra layer of tension that works well with the
slow, methodical grind of the climactic game. No matter how you expect
it to work out, odds are you won't predict the climax's exact events, which
is unusual for any sports movie. What sets Lucky You apart
is that it seems pretty sure that the sport it's about, while it may be
fun to watch, is not a good thing for its' players (honestly, I felt the
same way after watching Rounders, but knew the movie didn't agree
with me).
Thus,
the real issue here isn't Huck's glory or success, but his soul.
And Bana, who's never been better, does a great job of creating a character
who's sympathetic enough to root for, but whose constant ethical failings
come as no surprise. It would take someone almost ridiculously naive
to even hope for him to change, and Billie is just that person. Whether
by design or Barrymore's own limitations, there's something off about the
character, and I can't say that I ever really felt the romantic sparks
the movie wants me to invest in. But Huck's so messed up, I was willing
to accept any life preserver the universe was willing to toss him.
Plus, it's easy to see why someone would put up with him as long as L.C.
was close by. Duvall's probably the premiere Bad Father in the movies,
and his performance here is fascinatingly complex. L.C. has changed,
he's not the lout who ruined Huck as a child, but he's still got a stubborn
pride that insists on poking his son's wounds as long as they've gone to
the trouble of remaining open. And Debra Messing, as Billie's more
worldly sister, finds dramatic depth here I've never seen from her before.
But
perhaps the most compelling part of Lucky You is something so small
it's beneath most movies' notice: the extras. It would be easy
enough to write off Huck's soul-sickness as the product of a bad childhood
and an addictive personality if not for the world that surrounds him.
Table after table of shoulder-slouched, hopeless players, looking for a
deal of the cards or a pull of a lever to reverse decades of bad choices.
Everywhere he goes, he seems surrounded by the desperate faces of people
at the end of their rope. It's easy to see why, when he wrote The
Stand, Stephen King had all the evil people assemble in Vegas, and
I wouldn't have been surprised to see Hanson's World Series of Poker interrupted
by Trashcan Man pulling The Big One into town. About the only thing
that separates the movie's comic relief (some of it a little broader than
necessary) from the main characters is that they're too oblivious to realize
how pathetic their lives are.
If
the characters don't hook you, you're in for a rocky road, because Hanson's
pace is what we call deliberate in movies we like and slow as molasses
in ones we don't. I was interested in listening to these people talk
and seeing how many different ways Huck could find to screw up a good thing.
The film does its' best to lay out the rules and strategy of Texas Hold
'Em, and fills its' tables with quickly drawn, interesting characters and
actors (Jean Smart is a welcome addition to any movie). Casino
Royale wishes it could have done as much with the game as Lucky
You. I've never played or had much of an interest in this particular
brand of poker, but I followed it well enough to remain interested in the
fates of the players.
Dumped
as it is against the Spider-Man 3 juggernaut,
Lucky
You likely won't find much of an audience in theaters. Even if
it does, it probably won't make many friends at the Las Vegas Tourist Bureau
or raise ratings for The World Series of Poker. But it made me care
about the fates of a handful of people for two hours, something that can't
be said about its' competition. A lot happens in the movie that should
Stay in Vegas, but I sincerely hope Huck and Billie don't. |
