Skeptics may
dismiss 21 as a low-grade, teen-targeted remake of
Ocean’s 11 that cheats in legitimizing itself by cheekily
reminding its audience that it’s based on a true story. If the
film were about gambling, they might be right. However, 21
is as much about blackjack as Million Dollar Baby was
about boxing. Yes, the game provides a backdrop for the central
action, but the movie is far more about internal conflict than
it is about high-rollers winning lots of money. True-story or
not, 21 speaks a profound amount about what it means to
be a wide-eyed, collegiate-aged young man – a subject that, I
admit, I am the target-audience for.
The viewer
first meets protagonist Ben Campbell (Jim Sturgess), a
soon-to-be-graduate of Boston’s prestigious M.I.T., as he is
being interviewed for a coveted scholarship that will allow him
to attend Harvard Medical School. As he settles down to talk,
Ben is asked by his interviewer what separates him from the Next
Applicant. Sure, he has a 4.0 at one of the most rigorous
universities in America, he’s designing a robot with his friends
that will undoubtedly go on to win awards, and he’s involved in
dozens of extracurricular clubs. But nearly everybody applying
for the scholarship can boast these things; they’re all typical
Ivy-League geniuses.
What
distinguishes Ben from the rest of the pack is what follows the
interview lead-up in 21. 1994. After Ben’s mathematical
talents are realized during one class-period by elusive
professor Micky Rosa (Kevin Spacey), Rosa lures Ben into an
underground after-school club he runs to train gifted students
how to count cards in blackjack. Despite Ben’s initial
apprehension to join—the practice of counting is, of course,
against casino-rules—he realizes that he could make enough money
to pay for Harvard if his scholarship doesn’t come through. Rosa
takes only a 50% cut of the winnings and even pays for the
students to travel to Las Vegas to play on the weekends.
Ben learns the
craft of counting cold, just as one would expect of someone of
his intellectual capacity, and begins to win big with the help
of his teammates. Unfortunately, his ego gets to him when
thousands of dollars of cash begin to stack up in the
ventilation-system that shares a ceiling with his dorm-room. One
evening, Ben lets his common-sense fly out the window and sticks
to a table despite being disadvantaged by the count, losing
nearly all of the money that the group allotted for that weekend
in Vegas. Fuming, Rosa decides to make Ben’s life a living hell,
stealing back all of Ben’s earnings and dropping Ben from his
class, which Ben is required to take in order to graduate. Not
to mention, casino-employee Cole Williams (Laurence Fishburne)
is hot on Ben’s tale, recognizing that he may have a
card-counter in need of a beating on his hands when watching
numerous surveillance tapes.
A lot happens
in 21, but the movie consistently proves most fascinating
in the way that it depicts Ben’s struggle to come to grips with
the extraordinary situation that he finds himself in. Initially,
Ben lives in a secluded world amongst fellow Ivy-Leaguers; the
only problem he faces is that if he doesn’t find enough money to
attend Med School, he may end up making $100,000 a year instead
of $300,000. It’s fascinating to watch him thrust so quickly
into a polar-opposite situation due to a few surreal choices
that his life allows him to make. Suddenly, Ben is on a powerful
shit-list in Vegas, finds himself in a position in which he may
not graduate from M.I.T., and ends up once again entirely broke.
The movie’s
story is wild—I’m sure screenwriters Peter Steinfeld and
Alison Loeb took some liberties in embellishing the actual
one—but it is thankfully depicted with the utmost degree of
realism. Ben is conveyed as a sympathetic, authentic
twenty-two-year-old and, to a certain extent, the problems that
he faces in 21 serve as exaggerated versions of those
that all guys his age grapple with. His social angst and
uncertain feelings about the future, while exacerbated by late
nights in Vegas and ethical questions he faces about his
behavior, can be intimately related to by most people of his age
(myself included). The biggest reason for this is that lead
actor Jim Sturgess gives a wonderful, compassionate performance
in the role; he doesn’t try to make Ben into an overly snazzy
guy or a geeky cliché. Instead, Sturgess channels what a student
smart enough to get into Harvard Med School might really look
and act like, and the results are expectedly perfect. Ben comes
off as being as much an average guy as he is a math genius, a
nuanced combination that must’ve proved undeniably tough for the
actor to nail. With terrific work in Across the Universe
and this film under his belt thus far, I can’t wait to see where
Sturgess takes his career in the future.
Alongside
Sturgess, the rest of the cast is equally believable and
captivating. Kevin Spacey plays Rosa in a pretty
one-dimensional-villain sort of way, but the approach works
because it ensures that the audience never questions its
unconditional sympathy for Ben. Playing Ben’s
teammate/romantic-interest who’s just as sexy as she is smart,
Kate Bosworth makes a nice return to the silver-screen, not
having appeared in a film since 2006’s Superman Returns.
Straightforward as 21 may be from a narrative standpoint,
everyone involved ensures that it is delivered with all of the
complexity and vigor that it deserves. What a thoughtful,
entertaining treat the film is!
-Danny Baldwin,
Bucket Reviews
Review Published
on: 3.25.2008
Screened on:
3.4.2008 at the AMC Century City 15 in Century City, CA.
21 is rated PG-13 and runs 122 minutes.
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