victorianegri
I had the pleasure of seeing Bari Kang's "Lucky" at the New York City theatrical premiere last week. "Lucky" stands out with a 1970s aesthetic, with many gritty night shots of Kang driving through New York City's streets. The casting is superb, as the film is populated with real character actors, who fully and convincingly embody their characters. Alfredo Diaz is standout in particular, in his role of Fernando, adding a strange and uncomfortable joy to his character's menacing quality, which plays well off of Bari's character, Lucky, who is more restrained, with internal torment. Excited to see what the multi-talented Bari Kang does next!
sonam singh
So I had no plans of seeing this movie except that I happened to be attending a festival at Village East Cinemas and saw that "lucky" was playing with a Q/A and my boyfriend wanted to watch it. The movie is Good. Not Great but solid. The actors did a good job and the story, although familiar, (I'm an immigrant) had an interesting spin on it. It was unapologetic and I appreciated that. This is a real independent film and you can tell the budget must have been tight, which was acknowledged in the Q/A so that much more respect to the filmmakers for pulling it off. After hearing everything they had to do to get this made, you appreciate it that much more. Kudos to the team. The music was great too.
Harrison Tweed (Top Dawg)
Wow. In the worst way possible. This is 100% for certain the only other (2nd) honest review (as of chronological order to all the other reviews). The previous and only other honest review of 4, was being *very* generous! A score of 1 is awful, but not only was this film total garbage awful, it was annoying from the first 5 minutes. And it got worse. After 5 minutes I kept saying to myself, "be patient, it must get better, it has a great IMDb score" (7.2 at the time I saw it). Well, if I could give only one film I've ever rated a 0, this one would be it.At the half-way mark (and boy, was I patient to get that far!), I gave up and couldn't watch any more. I came back to *read* these great reviews to see if it had something outstanding coming up, only to find that *every* single review besides the 4, was fake! All of them! Only one lifetime review from all of them, and it was this garbage film.What's sad, is that if Bari (the director, writer and lead actor- if you want to call him that) had some honest reviews (or not added fake ones to up the score), I may have given this film a chance, and rated it appropriately as a 'D' grade beginner director/actor/writer with a slightly higher score (perhaps a 3 or 4). But getting greedy with the fake scores, just pisses me off, and compels me to tell it like it really is.There was absolutely nothing to praise about this film. Drama Class 101... don't keep staring at the rear view mirror 90% of the time when driving, and trying to convince the audience you are actually driving the vehicle.. oh, and ease up on the brow waxing, that's just annoying to keep looking at. The camouflage baseball cap... how many days in a row throughout the story was that worn? No wardrobe in the budget? And what the hell was the driver always reading when he was waiting for his passenger? Why even have that in the film? Was he as bored as the audience? Was this a subliminal religious message? Garbage. The plot, seen it too many times.. the 4 line summary explains the entire film. The writing, what's with trying to be a good samaritan all the time? Is Lucky King supposed to be a superhero? In what reality does one go out of their way to give their 20k life savings to an addicted gambler, then more money to have someone go looking for him? The directing, amateur hour. The score, terrible. The pace, slow. The editing, a mess. The acting, I've seen better grade 8 students in a high school drama class. You would think the lead Lucky could at least fake another facial expression, instead of that constant 'I'm too serious or bored' look that was so stale. And that annoying Punjabi video store owner was so sketchy and sleazy, he should only be in a Bollywood comedy, of which I would never watch. The only thing I enjoyed, was the location - NYC, where I too (like the only other honest previous reviewer mentioned) grew up. Great to see the old hood again. But then again, I could have just went on Google maps to see the old sites and enjoyed it more.Let's be clear here, this is a 'wannabe' Bollywood film, trying to get pawned off as an American Hollywood quality film. Sorry, not fooled. Well, not anymore now. And hopefully when everyone else sees this honest review, they will at least have low expectations to begin with going in, and perhaps enjoy it a little more, instead of looking for that 'great moment(s)' that never happen. When you call your lead 'Lucky King', you're aiming way too high, setting a bar you wont reach, then falling face first when you trip over your fake reviews. Pathetic. I'm willing to bet this film was financed by mom and dad giving an advance on one's allowance to make the dream of being successful in Hollywood true. It doesn't work that way... go to professional drama classes and accredited film schools and give it another shot, and be honest with your audience and viewers. Yes, everything about this film especially the deceit has left me sour. Thank God I didn't pay a dime to watch this crap. And dear IMDb, please do something about the fake reviewers, anything, please.Avoid at all costs, and don't even recommend it to your worst enemy. Yep, it's that bad.
