No. 49 Lucky You (2007) 29 of 100

 

Poker films are always a tough sell for me – they either treat their audience like idiots and say ‘five is more than four’ or they get too complex and it’s difficult to follow the action. ‘Lucky You’ is a decent effort but it definitely falls more into the former category than the latter.

Eric Bana (what happened to him?!) plays a Las Vegas poker pro. He’s seemingly not a very good one as the film opens with him hocking a camera (later revealed to be stolen from a friend) in a pawnshop along with his late mother’s wedding ring for a few hundred bucks. He takes the cash to a low stakes game and quickly runs it up to a few thousand bucks. He’s keen to raise the stake to enter the World Series of Poker main event which requires a $10k buy in.

He gets the money and then loses it. He then wins a seat at a satellite tournament but it is taken off him when it’s revealed the ancient dealer made an arse of it. In between these antics he meets Drew Barrymore and sponges some cash off her to play a game. The game he plays is shown for the less poker able viewers as Bana explains the terms and hands for her.

He makes enough to pay her back but then loses his money and has to steal back the money to gamble it up again. He’s basically an inveterate gambler with dodgy morals – but he’s good looking so that’s all right! His shady behaviour is explained by the presence of Robert Duvall who plays Bana’s father. The two have a chequered history as Duvall nicked the wedding ring that Bana later won back and then pawned and then lost back to Duvall – keeping up?

To pad out the time Bana takes on a prop bet involving golf which he narrowly loses due to Barrymore being honest with the timekeeping. Bana then gets staked for the big tournament but blows that cash too betting high cards with Duvall. Eventually he gets the cash together and the last half hour is the big tournament. You may think it’ll end up as father versus son but you’d be wrong – they do get down to the last three before ridiculousness takes over!

This was a decent effort that strolled along amiably for it’s bloated two hour run time. Part of that was due to the endless cameos of real life poker professionals who all looked like so many wooden chairs thrown on to the set. A few had lines too – terrible, cringe worthy lines!

What of Shannon you ask? Well he appears in two scenes; the first in the poker satellite where Bana beats him before the cards are re-dealt in Shannon's favour. He has short hair and didn’t convince as a poker pro. The two have an ongoing dialogue about ironing dresses which ends with Bana knocking Shannon out in the big tournament. He doesn’t have much of a character to work with and although he’s cast as a villain he just seems to mug along before being sent on his way.

The romantic subplot between Bana and Barrymore was awful with her correctly running a mile after he humps her and then steals her cash. She shows up at the end once he’s won a few hundred grand so it’s not clear who is the more morally bankrupt – they probably deserve each other.

Duvall was good as the manipulative Dad and I liked seeing Jean Smart off ‘Hacks’ as a poker pro, although she was shamefully underused. They also had Neil Tennant (or his doppelgänger!) on the final table too!

This was a decent confection but nothing substantial and the romance and Daddy issues plots both ended up pretty much as you’d expect.

When is Shannon-On? - 47.47

Outcome? Out of the tournament!

Film 3/5

Shannon Stars 2.5/5