Lucky You (2007) * * *

Directed by:  Curtis Hanson

Starring:  Eric Bana, Robert Duvall, Drew Barrymore, Debra Messing, Charles Martin Smith

Huck Cheever (Bana) grinds out a living playing poker on the Las Vegas strip.    Things aren't going so well lately.    Desperate to earn the $10,000 entry fee for the upcoming World Series of Poker, Huck hocks his mother's wedding ring and plies his trade at the poker tables.     He is on a first-name basis with casino managers and waitresses, who let him in on the lucrative games.    Huck's skill was learned from his estranged father LC Cheever (Duvall), who is a former world champion back in Vegas trying to reconcile with his son.     Huck hasn't gotten over his father's divorce from his mother.    His play as a "blaster" (a player who bets heavy and fearlessly in order to win money fast) may be attributed to his anger toward his father.     "You play cards like you should live your life and you live your life like you should play cards," LC tells Huck.    Huck doesn't understand that until a woman named Billie (Barrymore) walks into his life.

Huck likes Billie well enough, but he seems to be playing an angle at all times with her.    He is unable to see that she may be good for more than someone to teach poker to.    When he wins her some money at the table, you can sense he will be around later to "borrow" it to play more cards.    Billie, as played by Barrymore, is sweet and a bit naive.    She falls for Huck despite her sister Suzanne's (Messing) advice not to.    Huck is a pleasant guy, but is better at reading people when they play cards than in real life situations.    He doesn't sense his father's desire to reconcile any more than he senses that Billie sees him as a potential lifemate.   

Lucky You is entirely more fascinating when it deals with poker.   It knows its stuff.    We get a sense of the action and we learn the lingo.     Poker is a game of skill and a game in which you sometimes create your own luck.    Of course, landing that third 8 you need to knock your opponent out of a tournament is luck writ large.    But also needed is plenty of character and an ability to bounce back from a bad hand.     The pros seen in this film have made a living at playing the odds and knowing when to fold.    "Sometimes a good fold is as good as a win,"  Huck tells Billie.    There is a payoff later when Billie breaks up with Huck saying, "I'm making a good fold."   

The Huck/Billie romance isn't nearly as interesting.    They have more fights and breakups in their first week of knowing each other than most couples do in a lifetime.     The romance is perfunctory at best.    I'd give it another week until they call it quits for good.    Billie is the catalyst to Huck's realization that life is more than poker, but it seems added to the mix in order to boost the box office.     You get a sense the movie was hedging its bets.

Everything comes down to the final table at the WSOP, in which Huck and LC square off.    There is plenty of suspense in these sequences, especially when Huck and LC go head to head after a heart-to-heart chat in the men's room.     I know Huck forgives his father and all, but damn, throwing away pocket aces in that situation is so extreme we almost can't believe it.    Regardless, I admired Lucky You for its craftsmanship and its strong points, which involve a lot of hands of poker where Huck and LC do their stuff.