It really is a toss-up for me. I can’t decide what alternative titles I’d give to the movie, Lucky You. There’s: Rounders With Ugly People And No Plot, Parade of the Random Funny Characters That Do Nothing For the Story, Asinine A-holes, or perhaps Drew Barrymore Acting Like She’s Imitating Drew Barrymore, or Drew Barrymore with That Guy No One Knows, or my favorite: The Only Romantic Comedy Where You Pray, For the Love of God, The Characters Don’t Get Back Together.

And that would be because it’s about gambling addicts who are not only emotionally immature but also completely void of any moral compass whatsoever. When one of them, a character named Huckleberry (and no, I’m not kidding) played by an actor, Eric Bana, who LOOKS like he’s acting stumbles upon one of my favorite actresses, Drew Barrymore, whose character is a female named Billie from Bakersfield—you want to laugh but you can’t because it's so awful your face is twisted like someone dug their finger nails in and rotated their wrist 360 degrees. And it’s not because Billie is from Bakersfield—so am I. (And PS: that’s not Bakersfield where they did the small section of filming—we don’t have curbs like that.)

It’s because Billie proceeds to fall for an immature gambling addict with paternal issues, no real friends (or furniture)and doesn’t fail to cut him out of her life even after he lies and steals from her. Several times. And I guess Huckleberry falls for her too, but you wouldn’t really know that from his placid facial expressions. Women will gravitate to Barrymore’s character, however, because what woman alive today has not, at one point, pined after a man who neither deserved her nor was worth pining after? Miserable over a douche bag? Yeah—so is she. But in this movie no handsome prince rides in to rescue her from her own weakness. Instead she ends the movie saying something about his childhood in a way that sounds like she's being dirty. And it sounds so twisted and f-d up I had to look at Lindsey with an expression of horror. If you WINCE when the characters kiss at the end of the film-- there's probably a good chance it didn't accomplish what it's supposed to.

In the middle of this frustrating and appalling parade of desperation and dysfunction there is an endless stream of inventive, slightly entertaining curious characters who filter in and out of monotonous scenes of card-playing. Their only purpose, it seems, is to provide a bit of levity as you stare at hands flipping cards and knocking the table and really ugly people staring each other down. It’s as if the writer tried too hard to get a laugh though—one such superfluous character is a man with breast implants who hops across a casino room on a chair.

Umm….yeah. Seriously.

While the card playing drones on and multiple nutjob characters filter in and out (ok, a few are pretty funny) there is a father and son emotional stand-off. This is probably the only redeeming element of the movie. The father, played by Robert Duvall, is excellent. That’s because it’s Robert Duvall and he’s playing a role he frequently plays— himself. He does it really well, however.Why wouldn't he?

But you are so annoyed at what A-holes he and the son are to each other and other people, and what an idiot Billie is, and how confusing the Debra Messing’s character is, that you don’t want the father and son to resolve their issues or Billie and Huck to get together—you want to get the heck out of the theatre and leave them be. Instead you have to beat your head against the back of the seat because you’re in the middle seats. The NY Times and Dan Morehead were right— this movie SHOULD have been billed as a poker movie, not a romantic comedy. A BORING poker movie, but still, a poker movie nonetheless.

I should add, though, that the music was excellent and the writing was probably good before the actors butchered their lines. Sigh. Oh well...next time folks.