You Gotta Bet Big to Win Big

21, an Ocean’s Eleven for the post-MTV generation, is based upon the true story of how a handful of the brightest young minds in the country took Las Vegas for millions.

Ben Campbell (Across the Universe’s Jim Sturgess) is a shy, brilliant M.I.T. student who, needing $300,000 to pay for med school, realizes his entire future just may be in the cards – literally.

He is recruited by Micky Rosa (Kevin Spacey), an…unorthodox…math professor and stats genius, to join a team of gifted students that flies out to Sin City on weekends, armed with fake IDs and the know-how to turn the odds at blackjack in their favor.

By counting cards and employing an intricate system of signals, they can beat the casinos big time.

Seduced by the money, the lifestyle, and by his very smart and sexy teammate, Jill Taylor (Kate Bosworth, looking better than she has in the last two of years), Ben begins to push the limits.

Although counting cards isn’t illegal, the stakes are high, and the challenge becomes not only keeping the numbers straight, but staying one step ahead of the casinos’ menacing enforcer: Cole Williams (Laurence Fishburne), who is not amused he’s being replaced by state-of-the-art technology.

21 is adequate entertainment, but its main problem is it needed to be tighter, more precise.

The scenes in Las Vegas are obviously the most fun, but it’s a bit of a drag that once Ben and the team go back to M.I.T., he has to deal with the consequences of his actions.

That’s real, and necessary, but the filmmakers should’ve stepped away from the editing booth while they were ahead. Like in blackjack, there’s a limit they should’ve kept in mind.

Or, at the very least, they should’ve hidden their wild card (a twist I saw coming quite early on) a lot better.

My Rating **1/2

Photo: Sony Pictures.