The Lucky Ones is a 2007 American comedy-drama directed by Neil Burger and stars Tim Robbins, Rachel McAdams and Michael Peña.
The film was released in the US on September 26th, 2008 and was a box office bomb Having completed his latest tour of duty, middle-aged SSG Fred Cheaver has retired from military service and is returning home to his wife and son in suburban St. Louis.
Dunn plans to visit the family of her boyfriend, a soldier who was killed in action after saving her life, and Poole wants to engage the services of a sex surrogate he hopes will cure the impotence he is experiencing as a result of a shrapnel injury before he reunites with his girlfriend.
Arriving home in St. Louis, Cheaver learns his wife Pat wants a divorce, and his son Scott has been accepted at Stanford University.
Cheaver decides to visit his brother in Salt Lake City, but first drives Dunn and Poole to the airport so they can fly to Las Vegas.
They conflict with the man's adult children over the latter's anti-war sentiments and Cheaver is seduced by a guest who wants him to participate in a threesome with her and her husband Bob, but he abstains.
When Dunn discovers that a guitar similar to the one she is returning to her boyfriend's parents recently sold at an online auction for $22,000, she is tempted to give it to Cheaver, but he encourages her to complete her mission.
Poole had confessed to a casino robbery Dunn's boyfriend had claimed he committed before enlisting, to avoid returning to the Middle East by being sentenced to a prison term.
[1] In A Look Inside The Lucky Ones, a bonus feature included in the film's DVD release, he explained he intentionally avoided mentioning Iraq because he wanted the audience to concentrate on the heart of the characters rather than focus on the specific war they were fighting.
[1] Much of the film was shot on location in Illinois at sites including Alsip, Arlington Heights, Barrington, Bolingbrook, Chicago, Edwardsville, Naperville, Niles, O' Fallon and Park Ridge and Skokie.
After seeing a rough cut of the film in September 2007, Lions Gate Entertainment executives considered rushing it into theaters to qualify for Academy Award consideration.
But when the similarly war-themed films In the Valley of Elah, Rendition, and Lions for Lambs opened and failed to generate much box office revenue, the studio and Neil Burger decided to schedule it for Spring 2008.
"[6] Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times observed, "What makes "The Lucky Ones" so gratifying to me is anything but gravitas; these three characters are simply likable, warm, sincere, and often funny.
"[7] Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly graded the film B− and noted, "It's all very facile — war's domestic fallout made into feel-good fodder — but The Lucky Ones isn't dull, and the actors do quite nicely, especially McAdams, who's feisty, gorgeous, and as mercurial as a mood ring.
There are moments when the sought-after poignancy born of this dilemma is felt, but they are all too fleeting and dominated by exaggerated dramatics and broad comedy, especially as they relate to intimate matters.
"[10] Peter Hartlaub of the San Francisco Chronicle called it a "thoughtful portrait" but added, "As the film meanders, the powerful moments barely outnumber the ridiculous .
Some of the scenes adopt the forced wackiness of an Arrested Development episode, and the final 15 minutes are particularly frustrating [...] All of the actors make the best of well-intentioned plot turns that often don't feel true.
If it only had a brain ..."[11] Marjorie Baumgarten of the Austin Chronicle rated the film 2½ out of four stars and commented, "So far, the box office has not been terribly kind to movies about the Iraq war or the soldiers who wage it.
Yet, the story [...] contains too many coincidences and convergences to wholly ring true [...] Robbins is quietly effective as the elder of the bunch, while Peña shows us something of the growth of a cocky kid into sobering adulthood.