Win It All

A lot of people clearly don't, but I love subtle, simple, stripped-down, basically realist stuff like this, and this is an especially good example. The ending in particular, though it could easily appear to be almost nothing if you're not paying attention, is a gem of a thing, and means I'll rewatch. I'd like to gush a bit here about what makes it so special, but I can't do it without spoiling it. It's (almost) all in the word 'dying'.

An entertaining watch, but there's no recognizable climax to the story. There seemed to be potential, but the plot line was just a steady routine from start to finish. This was about as exciting of a story as forgetting to set your alarm clock and waking up on time anyway.

Jake Johnson (Let's be cops) stars as Eddie a guy who's down on his luck and addicted to gambling while trying to get his life back on track. Eddie soon gets into trouble after losing money he's supposed to be looking after as a favour. In debt and out of time, needing the money back can he 'win it all"? Co-staring is Jo Lo Truglio ( Brooklyn nine-nine).

Win it all, to me is just a low budget version of The Gambler staring Mark Wahlberg. Which I would say the latter is the better watch. Only just...

This Netflix Original film is average at best and just has no real depth to the film, a real lack of direction. Having said all of that the acting in this film is good and I felt there was good chemistry. One or two nice moments in the film but in the end you left feeling like maybe I've just wasted my time. Very forgettable. Review 5/10

"The urge to gamble is so universal and its practice is so pleasurable that I assume it must be evil." - Heywood Broun

Win It All is an unusually dark/light tale of card-gambling addiction because it subverts the usual notion that overcoming the addiction is just a McGuffin plot device. For Eddie (Jake Johnson), it is a matter serious enough to welcome us to join in his pain of avoiding the thing he loves to do and is not good at--gambling.

Eddie is asked to hold a bag while the owner does 6 months' time. Eddie is not to look in the bag, and if he is good about all this, he will earn $10,000. You can guess what happens to this compulsive gambler when he sees the money inside and foolishly convinces himself he can borrow, gamble, and return.

The pleasurable plot is that this rudderless gambler really tries to go straight, with some side roads to gambling, while his brother, Ron (Joe Lo Truglio) and sweetheart, Eva (Aislinn Derbez) try to coax him the right way. The story is never easy to figure ahead because he is such a loose cannon, capable of screwing up any good thing he starts.

Director Joe Swanberg lets us like Eddie while we're fearful of his ability to fall. We try not to invest in him, but he continues to screw up while we root. Eddie is a bit like Adam Sandler's Howard Ratner in Uncut Gems: ready to make a bad gamble at any moment but charming so we care even though we know he will disappoint us all.

The beauty of this 88 min melodrama is Eddie's character and the other characters who hope for Eddie's best. In that way Swanberg and co-writer Johnson create a semi-harrowing tale powered by character that ignores usual formula for gambling films.

Can you change a person who's addicted to gambling? Even more important, should you trust this person with money? Well you will find out once you watch this. The main character is very well cast and you get a nice supporting cast too. It's overall pretty decent for a movie of this kind but nothing special.

We also get treated to a love story and we know that there will be drama about the money. The brother figure gives this a whole different spin, though you are excused if you think there are quite a few glitches in logic to enhance drama. But that is how this works most of the time. Good enough, but nothing too exciting