Lucky - Official Trailer by Magnolia Pictures & Magnet Releasing

FILM REVIEW: Lucky

Directed by John Carroll Lynch. Reviewed by Paul Sorrell

With the cinemas closed, I wondered what I should review this month. I missed Lucky when it screened on Māori TV a few weeks ago, but then I learned that, during the Lockdown, the Dunedin Public Library was offering a free movie streaming service to members. Problem solved.

Played flawlessly by veteran actor Harry Dean Stanton at age 91, at first Lucky seems like a typical retiree living in a small town in Southern California. Setting off each day from his bungalow, where he labours over crosswords and watches game shows on TV, clad in his underwear and with a cigarette permanently in his mouth, he does the daily rounds of the café, the corner store and a sociable local bar.

But Lucky is not your average superannuitant. Thin, gaunt and a little frail he may be, but his step is sure and his mind razor sharp. A relentlessly honest thinker, he is unwilling to accept the conventional pieties. His crossword habit has taught him that “reality” is not just a seven-letter word, but “a thing” — a thing to be accepted and engaged with on a daily basis. For Lucky, reality is an existential void that he skirts daily.

Lucky’s unrelenting honesty shapes not only his philosophy — an attitude to life rather than a worked-out set of beliefs — but also his relations with other people. He’s not polite, he’s devastatingly direct. He can smell fakery a mile off and gives it no quarter. Seeing his friend Howard being courted by a smooth insurance agent, he lashes out, fists up. Howard is especially vulnerable because his beloved companion, a 100-year-old tortoise called Roosevelt, has wandered off into the desert. Like Lucky, Roosevelt is a relic of another world, steering his own way through life, not to be “owned” by anyone.

How does one act in face of the Void? Lucky’s answer is “smile”. The film ends with him standing on the edge of the desert as the light fades, gazing up in wonder at a stand of cacti, ancient and gnarled, their huge arms thrust into the evening sky.

Lucky’s beliefs and convictions may differ from those held by many readers of Tui Motu magazine. But, I hope, not his underlying values. Apart from his searing honesty, I admired his personal vulnerability, sensitivity to others, refusal to compromise, non-judgemental attitude and his capacity to love and show empathy without wearing his heart on his sleeve.

A remarkable film and an astonishing performance. See it if you can find it …

Tui Motu Magazine. Issue 248 May 2020