21.

"I bet that a faithful film adaptation of the true story behind Ben Mezrich's best-selling book Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story of Six MIT Students Who Took Vegas for Millions would sure make an interesting, entertaining movie," writes Neil Morris in the Independent Weekly. "I also bet the house that movie isn't 21, a so-called 'fact-based' interpretation of Mezrich's non-fictioner that is as slick and superficial as its Las Vegas backdrop."

Robert Wilonsky in the Voice: "Director Robert Luketic has pared down the story to the most hackneyed of three-act fairy tales - the whiny rise-and-fall film in which a bright young thing ditches his dorky pals and wills his way to a fortune, then loses it all in a fit of stupid hubris, then redeems himself only after his pile of cash turns to a pile of shit."

Updated through 3/30.

"The film is not able to make the frowned-upon practice of 'card counting' comprehensible, much less cinematic (unless you consider fast-shuffle editing to be cinematic), but then it's not really interested in mental acumen and application, only in the rewards and perks: a run-of-the-mill Sin City fantasy (dazzling montage of casino neon, top-of-the-world luxury suite, strip club, stacks and stacks of hoarded chips) in which the natural-born nerd can forget who his friends are, become somebody different, go around acting like a cross between Richard Gere in Pretty Woman and Michael Douglas in Wall Street." Duncan Shepherd in the San Diego Reader.

The New Republic's Christopher Orr experiments: "So profound is my sense that the trailer (which I've seen several times) gives away the entire movie (which I haven't yet seen at all) that I'm writing this review based solely on the former.... I'll catch a screening later to see how near or far from the mark I land, and will update this piece with an appropriate coda tomorrow."

"Surprise, surprise: money's not everything in the end, but there'd be little else to ooh and aah about here without it," writes Cathy Erway in the L Magazine.

"21 is a headache of a movie where every camera movement is overbaked and every turn of a card is accompanied by an unnecessary sound edit," writes Bradley Steinbacher in the Stranger.

"The only element in 21 that saves the film from being a dreary coming-of-age story grafted onto a two-hour commercial for the Las Vegas Visitors and Convention Bureau is [Kevin] Spacey, who does sparkling wickedness like almost no other actor of his generation," writes Alonso Duralde for MSNBC.

In the Boston Phoenix, Brett Michel notes the ways the movie departs from what actually happened.

John Horn tells the background story in the Los Angeles Times.

Updates, 3/28: So Christopher Orr's actually seen the movie now: "I'd say my pre-assessment was pretty close. The film is dull, overlong, morally confused, and just not very much fun."

It's a "feature-length bore," declares Manohla Dargis in the New York Times, where she proposes that "21 is either a very cynical or a very smart take on the power elite."

"Here's another example of a good story turned into a purely generic one - no doubt with the aid of a Bob McKee screenwriting seminar and textbook," writes Jim Emerson at RogerEbert.com.

"21 is a mini-Ocean's Eleven about, and for, people who are the age of its title," quips Nick Schager in Slant.

"[I]ts formulaic plot adds little to the weekend must-see list, much less the grand nerd narrative," writes Nicolas Rapold in the New York Sun.

"A pleasant evening of whist would be a lot more exciting," suggests Salon's Stephanie Zacharek.

"Welcome to a slick but resoundingly empty movie in which mental agility, beauty and brilliance are a sort of moral base line for the cast, which includes Jim Sturgess and Kate Bosworth, two performers who exude vigor, youth, beauty and gently buffed immortality," writes Desson Thompson in the Washington Post.

"As it heads into the second hour, 21 loses its buzz and slips into a predictable series of life lessons, double crosses, and the group's ever-more-desperate (and unintentionally hilarious) efforts to be incognito," writes Scott Tobias at the AV Club.

"Putting aside any disappointment that the filmmakers didn't find something more challenging within the material, 21 does have its charms," argues Kevin Crust in the Los Angeles Times. "Director Robert Luketic (Legally Blonde) has made the increasingly rare two-hour movie that actually feels shorter, and the cast - given the limitations of their characters - is across-the-board enjoyable." Also, Deborah Netburn gets Jeff Ma, the RL guy at the heart of the real story, to present an annotated list of the "most realistic gambling movies."

Cinematical's Erik Davis talks with Sturgess.

Update, 3/30: Ryan Stewart for Premiere: "There are moments where Spacey and Bosworth have their fun in spite of the film - they both adopt Southern 'characters' as disguises at one point, which is a hoot - but overall, 21 is a busted hand."

Posted by dwhudson at March 27, 2008 11:55 AM