The film is based on the novel by Ben Mezrich released in 2002 and it describes a real story of a group of MIT technological students, who develop a rather complex and at that time effective strategy of playing blackjack. This strategy and well-coordinated teamwork allow them in the nineties to heat the casino for very tangible sums – it is known that in one of the best weekends the MIT group (they named themselves by the acronym of the institute) won about $400,000, and in just a few years of the group’s existence, they won about $10 million.
So the phrase that, say, the film is based on real events – it is, formally, correct: indeed there was a group of students who developed a scheme of team play in blackjack, and this scheme allowed them to win for a long time.
In general, it must be said that the source material for the film was potentially very rich. Students developed a system against the casino and successfully used it for many years.
Screenwriters and director Robert Luketic gave exactly what many people awaited. The latter is known for directing the teenage comedy Legally Blonde.
In principle – yes, this is the kind of person Columbia Pictures had to be entrusted to shoot 21 if you plan a picture exclusively for a non-future teenage audience.
The movie begins with a very funny scene – our hero Ben (Jim Sturgess) sits in the office of the university chief and begs for a scholarship – just like Reese Witherspoon 10 years ago. To get half a million, you need to be very different from other excellent students. Ben, snaring a terrible face replicant, begins a pitiful story about how he won half the world and immediately lost everything.
We will talk about it further in the next paragraphs but the movie mainly concerns blackjack and how a team of genius youngsters makes money by taking part in various casinos. The calculation and use of maths are really on point in the movie and when it comes to playing casino games frequently alongside luck, math is also very important. The movie fueled a big flow of people who started playing real money blackjack online and surprisingly a lot of them achieved considerable success. So the movie was indeed a driver for some people.
Ben is the average scored smart student from Boston, studying at Harvard. The problem is obvious – they guy lacks money for education in the university. You, of course, it is possible to get a scholarship, but it is not possible to stand out yet.
No one’s going to make a guy a movie hero unless he’s talented. Ben has outstanding mathematical abilities, coupled with a desire to learn and a phenomenal memory. This could not be missed by a university lecturer, later known as Mickey (Kevin Spacey). The teacher is very businesslike, in addition to his teaching career, he developed a system of poker. Assembling a team of five students, he rocks the famous Las Vegas casinos every weekend. Ben, is asked to join this “secret society.” Puzzled by the eternal shortage of money and Harvard, as well as the most beautiful girl of the university, he decides to take a chance.
There is nothing extraordinary about the film that would single it out of a number of similar ones. After watching it sometime on TV on a harsh weekday, you will immediately forget about it. The big screen adds a good picture of colors. First of all, it is shot very nicely, glamorously even in places, secondly, the visual effect with the camera and the increase of the image as under the microscope adds passion and gives at least some dynamics.
There are a lot of pluses as well. It is always nice to look at beautiful faces. And when the face is smart and the eyes like a tremulous doe – it is doubly pleasant. Interesting presentation of the scheme of the game, the layout on the shelves of thoughts of a genius. The truth for the genius approach turned out to be too simple and logical. Nothing supernatural – only simple math! But what are the mathematicians themselves: Ben’s friends are something! The assessment system is 7.34 out of 10.
Robert Luketic’s new film is real and, it seems, even a conscious antipodean of his Legally Blonde.
There, the girl from Beverly Hills ascended to the heights of the law faculty at Harvard, then a medical student, also from Harvard, swerve from the thorny path of teaching, sabotages the preparation for the competition for the most agile model of the robot and descends into Las Vegas. And all this is almost pure truth: the plot of 21 is based on the famous American story of the gambler Jeff Ma.
On the stage comes a professor of mathematics (Kevin Spacey, co-producer of the film), the coach of a team of glamorous excellent students, weekly raids on the casino in Las Vegas. And the fact is that nothing is illegal. The guys win using a system of secret signs, code words, dressing up, and, of course, brains. In between training and night-time, Ben is glued to a seductive but impregnable companion (Kate Bosworth). And from above, through the lenses of hidden cameras, all the security officers of all the casinos of the world (Lawrence Fishburne) watch everything.
Under his unkind gaze, 21 turns from the drama of growing up into a natural Ocean 14. Unfortunately, the actual storm begins ten minutes before the finale, when Spacey himself appears at the tables. But in my opinion, this is a movie everything should see once in their lifetime.
