Going into DIFF, Lucky was one of my top three films I had to see. Just the one sentence log line will draw you in, “Serial killer wins the lottery and pursues his lifelong crush”. Thankfully I was not duped by a catchy log line, like Hollywood is used to by now, and the film actually delivered and satisfied my curiosity.
The official synopsis from DIFF‘s website:
“It seems like a dream come true when Ben Keller (Colin Hanks) wins the Iowa State Lotto. But, for everyone else in his life, it’s the beginning of darkly comic nightmare. With $36 million at his disposal, Ben has the new found confidence to pursue his lifelong crush, Lucy St. Martin (Ari Graynor). Can all the money in the world compensate for the fact that Ben is a fledgling serial killer? As their relationship spirals out of control and the body count rises, Lucy and Ben do all they can to survive love, marriage, and each other. The dark romantic comedy also stars Jeffrey Tambor, and Academy Award nominee Ann-Margret“.
I want to first advise, Ben is not the main character in the film. He actually has very little dialog in the film and not an abundant amount of screen time. The main focus is his love interest, Lucy, and how she struggles with her emotions and doing whatever it takes to get the lotto money from Ben.
This is a very hard film to do a review about because I don’t want to give to much away since that will spoil the surprises in the film. The dry and dark humor associated with the film is awesome because it’s not too dark like World’s Greatest Dad, but just the right amount. Jeffrey Tambor plays a police detective investigating the latest disappearance of the woman Ben has recently killed. Although he doesn’t play a huge role in the film, the times he is on screen he really delivers and was a great addition to the film. Also, Colin did a fantastic job of playing this very likable serial killer who you develop a connection with. You don’t see him as a bad person even when you see him killing one of the girls because he just has this charm that makes you want to say, ” It’s OK Ben, she deserved it”.
Let’s get to Ari Graynor and her role as Lucy. A lot of people in the audience gave her praise (because she was in attendance) for her role and how she was amazing. I guess I was the only one who had an issue with her and didn’t feel like she was a proper fit for the role. She was very awkward to watch on screen, I don’t know if this was how they intended her character to be or just her in generally. I want to say this, Graynor wasn’t terrible in her role, however, I felt she could have been better or maybe brought more to the table. To me it didn’t seem like she and Colin had the proper chemistry for their onscreen romance but she disagreed, which you will see below in the Q &A after the film.
Overall I really enjoyed Lucky and I’m glad I was not disappointed because I did go into the film with very high expectations. I don’t know if it will win anything at the festival because it has some pretty strong competitors but it might win the audience award. I wish it the best and hope it does well and can’t wait to see more from director Gil Cates Jr. in the future.
Rating: Clever concept for a serial killer comedy (7/10)
After the film there was a Q & A session with Ari Graynor and the film’s director Gil Cates Jr. which I recorded, however, the audio cuts in and out because their microphones weren’t working properly. Below, I have provided a quick overview of what was said by the two.
- Ari stated that even though there was a script, they did a lot of improv and made most of the jokes up as they went along.
- According the Gil, the film has been picked up by Phase 4 film for distribution and they are planing on releasing the film in New York and L.A on July 15th along with releasing it on Video On Demand. Depending on how the film opens they will decide on doing a wider release.
- The entire film was shot in Iowa and took 28 days to film. They filmed 5 days a week with a budget of $6 million.
- To recreate scenes in Hawaii, they shot the locations in a zoo in Iowa to make it seem like a rainforest environment.
- When asked about her onscreen romance with Colin, Ari said they had great chemistry and that it was never awkward because his fiance was there and she became very close with her.
- Gil’s college friend Kent, who is a staff writer for Saturday Night Live, help come up with the idea and wrote the script for the film. The film as written years ago but they started moving forward with the film in 2009
- In the film, Lucy has a pet bird named Curt that really does nothing besides sits in a cage and fly’s into Jeffrey Tambor’s face. However, according to Ari, the bird’s handler was the biggest diva on set and would freak out because Curt was getting agitated and they being too rough with Curt’s cage.
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