Luck

Luck starts off a good note. The style, action and execution is heavily inspired from Dhoom 2 and Race. Sadly its ends up as an overdose of it. The storyline is good and indeed had the potential to join the league of yet another stylised thriller.

For starters, the "game show/betting" should have been given more screen time for the concept to sink into the audience. Too much time was devoted for Imran Khan's background and too little for a few.

π Imran Khan:: Attempting for a chocolate-hero-to-action-hero makeover too-much-too-fast. Chaacha Chowdhary's inputs required desperately.

π Shruti Haasan:: Lookswise has an uncanny resemblance to Sonali Bendre. In terms of launchpad, Luck is no-doubt a very bad choice in every aspect. Be it too much of skin show or entry into the storyline just before interval. Kamal Hasan's tag/ genes can be too much of weight to bear and it shows. In terms of performance it feels that she is delivering more than warranted. Nonetheless, has a great screen presence.

π Sanjay Dutt:: Sometime ago, he wanted to attempt sequel to Kaante and perhaps the idea has eventually translated into Luck. There are too many similarities as well - for instance the entire assemble in Kaante is orchestrated by Sanjay Dutt. Anyways, in Luck there was no meat to his character.

π Chitraashi:: The character got dwarfed amongst the biggies.

π Mithun:: His track was a straight-lift from "Major" Kaante. Koi Shaq?

π Ravi Kishen:: Desperate attempt to copy Anthony Hopkins, albeit failed one.

π Danny:: Passable.

π Rati & Rupa Ganguly hardly had any presence.

Mr. Renzil D'Silva (Rang De Basanti), you were absolute let-down.

Soham, it obvious that you failed to learn "all-that-it-takes" from the master.

PS:: There is no normal sentence in the movie, every character barks "dialogues".

Indian Cinema has unarguably proved its mastery over the genre of drama and comedy in the past decades. But if we look upon the thrillers made in our part of the world, then there is still lot to achieve as per the International Standards. "Luck" also falls in the same category of thriller movies based on weak scripts relying heavily on its huge star-cast and exciting action sequences. In fact, here we have a movie, made only on an idea of human life being used in the betting mafia and has no basic script heading towards any particular event.

The movie starts off excitingly, introducing Sanjay Dutt as the Don of betting trade participating in a dangerous death race himself. And then the background narration (by Danny) unfolds the entire star-cast with their different individual sequences. Actually, these are those needy people, chosen to play the dangerous life taking games arranged by the betting Don. But surprisingly this introduction chain exceeds its desired limits and continues till we reach the Intermission. In short the first half is only about the Introductions and has nothing in terms of story or content.

So, all expectations are set for an engrossing second half, showcasing a grand thrilling event and a great exciting climax. But sadly nothing goes as expected and we are only made to witness some unexplained and uninteresting sequences leading to nowhere. Usually in a script where few characters are brought together for a purpose, everything moves towards a specific event or a plan which has a great excitement value. But in "Luck", there is neither any striking spectacular event nor a crescendo kind of impact, building towards its climax. The writers are only interested in talking about the idea of betting mafia playing games involving human lives and that's it.

In order to give it an International look, director Soham, emphasizes more on the glossy and technical aspect of the project and less on its lackluster content and storyline. As a result, the movie based on a groundless script, gives no opportunity to any artist in particular to prove his art. In fact, one wonders why veteran artists like Sanjay Dutt and Danny opted for this movie with no great roles written for them. Sanjay, though looks great as the Don, has got nothing new to deliver other than the usual Bhai stuff. Danny is simply, mis-cast as the Sutradhar or the person responsible for getting every player together.

Imran, with a great fan following should be more careful in choosing his projects as this will be his second movie in a row, which fails to impress. Shruti Hassan, who comes just before the intermission, has got great screen presence, but should work on her dialogue delivery as she sounds uncomfortable speaking her Hindi lines. And there was really no need of her Bikini act in the movie as "the script never demanded it".

Mithun Da is completely wasted. He unconvincingly uses his famous dialogue "Koi Shaque" from "Ghulami", which simply fails to generate the similar impact as in the original. Above all, both Ravi Kishan and Chitrashi are able to impress the most with their splendid performances. Among the songs added for some glamour value, only "Aazma Luck" impresses to some extent. Background score on the other hand serves the purpose perfectly. Cinematography brilliantly captures the well directed action sequences both in the air and below the water. But their brilliance goes in vain, in absence of a good storyline and captivating writing.

So, for thrillers fans, the movie may be below their expectations, with no great excitement or special unique points to mention here. And if you are a real movie buff then you surely must have seen many better flicks in the same genre before.

This film has the best dialogue, the best character development ever seen and the best action sequences in any film ever. This is a must watch for every Netflix user who has watched Squid Games as it will show them the true experience, the way it was supposed to be written.

Netflix should be ashamed that they tried to recreate this true marvel, and failed at the first hurdle. No writer can ever truly beat this masterpiece of a movie as it has no flaws.

It is the definition of perfection.

Netflix ripped out the core of this once in a lifetime experience and paid off all the other reviewers in 2009 using a Time Machine to make sure that this never rose from the dead desert. Truly sickening to see, I will be suing Netflix alongside the writer to protect his goldmine of a movie.

10/10- the best thing to ever happen to this planet (apart from Jesus's birth, death, resurrection and accession).

It was something that I had not expected at all and therefore was rather taken back by its contents. A Mafia kingpin is obsessed by gambling not in the usual way but with peoples lives and he finds those who are in need of money and puts them through tasks, which can result to be very costly if they decide to leave or aren't able to complete.

Starring Mithun Chakraborthy, Sanjay Dutt, Imran Kham, Ravi Kishan, Danny Denzongpa and Chitrashi Rawat. Shruti Hasan, daughter of Kamal Haasan, is introduced in this, while Rati Agnihotri makes a special appearance. This is directed by Soham Shah and Salim – Suleiman provide the music score.

This is Imran Khan's third film in which he is in action for the second time, the previous being "Kidnap" and he is good in some scenes but unfortunately, his character of a person who needs money, goes from convincing to unconvincing as the movie progresses. Shruti Haasan, making her debut in this, has shown signs of potential talent and also has the looks as well and given some time, she will accelerate in this career. But the two actors who were conspicuous throughout are Sanjay Dutt and Danny Denzongpa but the same cannot be said for Mithun Chakraborthy as his was rather on the weak side and felt that much more could have been done to his character but was not.

Director and writer Soham Shah has tried to introduce a new type concept with its theme of gambling and having the characters play Russian roulette and has added on some stunts, which are not anything new but do look spectacular and nothing else. But somehow, the film does manage to keep the audience stick to their seat and yet it fails to click as no one who is in the right frame of mind would play Russian roulette with their lives even if they need money.

This film just does not appeal or click but is just about watchable but unfortunately is a flop.

Luck has an impressive star-cast full of talented actors--established and new--whom we don't get to see too often. The movie has a unique, twisted storyline where Sanjay Dutt plays a don who runs an underworld betting organization that puts money on certain people's luck. These people have been hand-picked from around the world based on their "luck," which uncannily puts odds in their favor in major tasks, challenges, obstacles, or games. Players get a high gambling on the lives of these "lucky elite" who participate in suicidal tasks.

The film's USP is definitely its amazing action sequences. What is even more surprising is that the stars did actually perform several of the stunts themselves. Skydiving, swimming among shark-infested waters, and running on a train are just some of the beautifully captured scenes in marvelous African locales. Cinematography and special effects are great. Music is quite good too, accompanied with nice videos.