Lucky me

Noel Vera

You have to give credit to director Curtis Hanson; he tries his
level best not to repeat himself. After making his bones with
suspense ("The Bedroom Window;" "The Hand That Rocks The
Cradle;" "The River Wild") he does a noir epic ("L.A.
Confidential,") that wins him a few Oscar nominations, then follows
that up with a comedy on writers ("Wonder Boys"), a gritty urban
fairy-tale about a rap artist ("8 Mile"), and now this. I find the
post "L.A." films to be the most interesting ("8 Mile" being my
favorite so far)--Hanson attempting the unenviable task of throwing
away the crutches of genre filmmaking (suspense, noir), to focus on
character and human relationships.

It doesn't help matters that poker is hardly the most visually
lively of games. Critics have compared this picture to Robert
Rossen's classic "The Hustler," often unfavorably, and no wonder:
with all the overhead lamps hanging over pool tables the players
look almost Bergmanish in their shadowy, black-and-white intensity
(poker on the other hand occurs in a bright space lit solely for the
benefit of TV cameras). And you can do trick shots with pool, shots
that Rossen photographs simply, the better to capture their
impossibility (my favorite has the cue ball put such english on a
ball that it shot forward, curved around backwards in a small
parabola, and sent a third ball into its pocket).

Poker isn't like that; if anything, the drama is in the immobility
of the players, the cards held up or face down, the mystery of one's
hand, whether you hold nothing or a royal flush--or are able to
convince your opponent that you're holding a royal flush.

Hanson does well enough with the game sequences. He has Huck Cheever
(Eric Bana) introduce the intricacies of Texas hold 'em to Billie
Offer (Drew Barrymore); Huck points out that much of the game
depends on one's reading of the body language and 'tells' of the
opponent and maintains that poker is a game of skill, not chance
(Huck's downfall is in not recognizing that it's really a mix of
both). Hanson's camera closes in on the players' faces, a mix of
recognizable Hollywood character actors (Bana, Jean Smart, Robert
Duvall as LC, Huck's father) and real celebrity players (Sam Farha,
Doyle Brunson), and the sheer brinksmanship on display makes for
compelling drama. That, and the details--the knuckles rapped on felt
in a call-and-reply; the insider slang ("blind;" "double-
blind;" "check;" "river"); the sense that one is in a separate but
equal world few of us even suspect exist, but would probably like to
visit if we ever did. That Hanson can do this to poker-- to the
sight of men at a table, holding cards--is an achievement in itself;
more, he brings what he knows about cutting and shooting thrillers
into play here--the games are intricately staged and exciting, not
despite the intricacy but because of it. The terminology and
gestures add a unique flavor to the action.

As for the plot--well, that's actually the weakest part of the film.
Bana and Barrymore are easy on the eyes, and Bana has a laser focus
of a stare he's used through "Hulk," "Munich" and even that deadly
bore "Troy" (he looked as if his Hector could whip Brad Pitt's
Achilles with his big toe), and Barrymore has what can only be
described as one of the most empathic faces on the Hollywood screen--
every emotion on her face comes across as unfiltered and direct,
unmeditated by thought or pretension or acting philosophy.
Unfortunately, the two can't quite bring their romance to life--he's
afraid of commitment, she becomes his moral compass; the arc of
their relationship is about as unpredictable and cliché-free as
sunrise. Hanson does have a lovely way of not letting his actors
build up melodramatic steam; instead he has them grapple a bit, go
off in oblique, unhappy directions, come back later for more
wrestling. The figureheads, however, remain figureheads (he wayward;
she morally superior); maybe what was needed was a more mercurial
actor, someone who can charm us same time he scares us with his
temper (Bana's an interesting casting choice, in that he's anything
but temperamental).

The lack becomes sharper when Robert Duvall comes into play. Easily
one of the most authoritatively easygoing presences around, Duvall
can simply take over a scene by leaning back and giving you a wink;
you believe Bana would feel inferior to the man--what's more
difficult to believe is that Bana can at any point hold his own.
Actually, Huck's relationship with L.C. is another problematic
cliché--the upstart youngster living in the shadow of a living
legend of a father (Didn't Duvall deal with this already in "The
Great Santini?" Didn't Stallone deal with this, and--gasp--
relatively more effective poignancy?). Duvall not only wipes Bana
off the screen, he does so while easing himself effortlessly into
the milieu--when the camera pans across the table, from player to
player to Duvall, you don't feel any disconnect; he belongs to the
poker table as naturally and inevitably as chips. Bana tends to
stand out as a Greek God type come to Earth to play; Duvall looks as
if he's one of the boys--the meanest, orneriest, baddest ass of the
lot, too.

"Lucky You" is so good it's disappointing it isn't better; one would
think that Hanson, eschewing the obvious and avoiding most clichés,
would go all the way and strike out in his own direction. It's not
as if he doesn't have models he can follow, or at least take
inspiration from--I'm thinking of something as recent as Tian
Zhuangzhuang's "Wu Qingyuan" (The Go Master, 2006), where
Zhuangzhuang has to deal with an even less visually appealing game,
Go (In terms of intricacy it's to chess what advanced calculus is to
basic arithmetic--the number of possible games in Go reportedly
exceeds the number of known atoms in the universe). Zhuangzhuang
adopts an interesting approach--he foregoes depicting the games
altogether and attempts to evoke the mindset of a man playing Go--
the fanatical, almost insane focus on the board, to the exclusion of
all else (even, at one instance, the atom bomb).

Then there's Robert Altman's "California Split," for my money the
finest film ever made on the subject. Altman not only does away with
clichés, he does away with the cliché of a narrative altogether--the
film is a series of vignettes about two gamblers (George Segal,
Elliot Gould) who meet, become friends, go to Reno and have a Big
Game. What happens at the game, however, isn't quite what one
expects--the look on Segal's face as he holds his winnings is
haunting, unforgettable (What was he thinking? Why does he do what
he does?). There are women in the film, but romantic attachment is a
none-starter; everyone's too absorbed in their own schtick to feel
romantic about anything, though there's a scene where Gould consoles
Gwen Welles by telling her about the size of a blue whale's tongue
that's beautifully, tenderly oddball. Altman had the guts to pull
this gossamer creation together almost out of thin air, and in a
mainstream Hollywood film; Hanson has yet to do anything as
amazing. "Lucky You" is a brave try--bravish--and should be
appreciated as such; one wishes one can appreciate it more.

(First published in Businessworld 5/11/07)

(Comments? Email me at noelbotevera@...)