ianrandalstrock (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} ianrandalstrock) wrote,@ 2008-03-25 14:01:00 |
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21—a movie review
Saw 21 last night. As with lots of movies, the less you know about it going in, the better you'll like it. In this case, I haven't yet read the book it's based on (Bringing Down the House),but I do know enough about it and the backstory to realize that this movie is a very different adaptation. In the same vein, I know enough about how the Las Vegas casinos operate to know that there were some liberties taken with their reality in the movie (not enough that the average person would find them disconcerting). And I recognized far too readily Boston University's Towers dormitory and Bay State Road as our hero's MIT dorm room.
But leaving aside all those little details which must be changed to make a good movie, I enjoyed this one. It moves very quickly (it definitely didn't feel like the 123 minutes IMDB claims it runs). Graduating MIT senior Ben Campbell (Jim Sturgess) has his whole life working out just as he's planned it, except for the looming inability to pay for Harvard Medical School, to which he's been accepted. Campbell is a genius, on several levels, and displays his mathematical talents in a class, which brings him to the attention of his professor, Micky Rosa (Kevin Spacey). Rosa invites Campbell to join his team…his blackjack team. And from there we're off and running.
Rosa has assembled a team of students who are adept at the simple—but incredibly rapid—mathematics needed to gain the edge in blackjack from the house. "This is a business," he repeats, "we're not gambling." And the numbers prove him out. The blackjack team has been making good money for quite a while. But there's an opening on the team, and comparing what they can make on a weekend Las Vegas junket to Campbell's $8 an hour in a clothing store, it doesn't take a math whiz to figure out how to spend his time. Of course, nothing is ever simple in the land of Hollywood (or Las Vegas, or pretty much anywhere else), and after Campbell's first $20,000-weekend trip, he's in for setbacks and confusion. But they're all part of the story, and help him to grow into the person he needs to be.
Campbell is an engaging character, and the other members of the team are also fully fleshed-out, fully realized people (I was very impressed with the entire cast). We see Campbell mature from being "just" a hyper-smart nerd to being a worldly young man with a lot of experience earned through some hard knocks and some easy gifts. The hard work is glossed over (this is, after all, a movie), but we know it was there.
The year in which the movie takes place isn't made explicit, in part to appeal to a present-day audience (the book was written five years ago about events that were ten years in the past then), so there are some asynchronicities having to do with the changing world and new technologies, but again, they can be safely ignored to enjoy the movie.
Don't bother looking for a sequel: you can safely feel that the story is complete in this one movie. But do look for it: it's a good movie.
Saw 21 last night. As with lots of movies, the less you know about it going in, the better you'll like it. In this case, I haven't yet read the book it's based on (Bringing Down the House),but I do know enough about it and the backstory to realize that this movie is a very different adaptation. In the same vein, I know enough about how the Las Vegas casinos operate to know that there were some liberties taken with their reality in the movie (not enough that the average person would find them disconcerting). And I recognized far too readily Boston University's Towers dormitory and Bay State Road as our hero's MIT dorm room.
But leaving aside all those little details which must be changed to make a good movie, I enjoyed this one. It moves very quickly (it definitely didn't feel like the 123 minutes IMDB claims it runs). Graduating MIT senior Ben Campbell (Jim Sturgess) has his whole life working out just as he's planned it, except for the looming inability to pay for Harvard Medical School, to which he's been accepted. Campbell is a genius, on several levels, and displays his mathematical talents in a class, which brings him to the attention of his professor, Micky Rosa (Kevin Spacey). Rosa invites Campbell to join his team…his blackjack team. And from there we're off and running.
Rosa has assembled a team of students who are adept at the simple—but incredibly rapid—mathematics needed to gain the edge in blackjack from the house. "This is a business," he repeats, "we're not gambling." And the numbers prove him out. The blackjack team has been making good money for quite a while. But there's an opening on the team, and comparing what they can make on a weekend Las Vegas junket to Campbell's $8 an hour in a clothing store, it doesn't take a math whiz to figure out how to spend his time. Of course, nothing is ever simple in the land of Hollywood (or Las Vegas, or pretty much anywhere else), and after Campbell's first $20,000-weekend trip, he's in for setbacks and confusion. But they're all part of the story, and help him to grow into the person he needs to be.
Campbell is an engaging character, and the other members of the team are also fully fleshed-out, fully realized people (I was very impressed with the entire cast). We see Campbell mature from being "just" a hyper-smart nerd to being a worldly young man with a lot of experience earned through some hard knocks and some easy gifts. The hard work is glossed over (this is, after all, a movie), but we know it was there.
The year in which the movie takes place isn't made explicit, in part to appeal to a present-day audience (the book was written five years ago about events that were ten years in the past then), so there are some asynchronicities having to do with the changing world and new technologies, but again, they can be safely ignored to enjoy the movie.
Don't bother looking for a sequel: you can safely feel that the story is complete in this one movie. But do look for it: it's a good movie.
