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Lucky Ones, The
Roadside Attractions

Lucky Ones, The reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 53 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
6.6 out of 10
based on 25 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 5 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: R for language and some sexual content

Starring Rachel McAdams, Tim Robbins, Michael Pena, Molly Hagan, Mark L. Young, Howard Platt, Arden Myrin, and Coburn Goss

T.K. Poole, Colee Dunn and Fred Cheever arrive in New York from Germany only to find their connecting flights canceled due to a power outage. Anxious to get to their respective destinations, they agree to share a rented minivan to suburban St. Louis where Cheever is to reunite with his wife and teenage son. From there, the other two plan to fly to Las Vegas where the macho T.K. wants to make an important stop before seeing his fiancee and the tough yet naive Colee plans to pay a visit to a fallen fellow-soldier's family. But when Cheever's homecoming turns out to be a far cry from what he anticipated, the trio's one-day drive expands into an impromptu cross-country marathon. (Roadside Attractions)


GENRE(S): Comedy  |  Drama  
WRITTEN BY: Neil Burger
Dirk Wittenborn
 
DIRECTED BY: Neil Burger  
RELEASE DATE: Theatrical: September 26, 2008 
RUNNING TIME: 113 minutes, Color 
ORIGIN: USA 

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

75
Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
This formula is fraught with pitfalls, but the characters and the actors redeem it with a surprising emotional impact.
Read Full Review
75
Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
This is more than the story of soldiers grappling with stress and doubt as they reenter the "normal" flow of domestic life. It's about strangers bonding, about friendship and discovery, about the comedy and tragedy of the human experience.
Read Full Review
75
Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
This movie has its own emotional sorcery. In a raw, humorous way, it grasps how hope and desperation spur magical thinking and, sometimes, real magic.
Read Full Review
70
Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
I'd hate to guess whether most Americans know, any more than these fictional partygoers, what soldiers go through in Iraq. But if the market for movies about the war is any indication, they don't want to.
Read Full Review
70
The New York Times Laura Kern
Because the lead actors work so well together, adding depth and levels of vulnerability to fairly underwritten roles, the emotional consequences of the sense of displacement these "lucky" characters -- lucky to be alive, lucky to have met one another -- must deal with always ring true.
Read Full Review
67
Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
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.
Read Full Review
67
The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin
Like its lead characters, Lucky is wounded, lost, and impractical, but it has a messy, winning humanity and an agreeably leisurely pace that almost redeems it.
Read Full Review
63
Boston Globe Wesley Morris
As close as a movie about three Iraq war soldiers should come to mediocre TV comedy.
Read Full Review
63
Premiere Stuart Levine
While the journey is somewhat bumpy and awfully contrived at times, the characters making the trek are ones we don't mind being cooped with for long stretches of highway.
Read Full Review
63
ReelViews James Berardinelli
The weakest aspect of The Lucky Ones is by far the conclusion, which is flat and contrived.
Read Full Review
63
TV Guide Ken Fox
An entertaining road movie with a topical point: The three passengers on this cross-country trip are U.S. soldiers who've just returned from Iraq.
Read Full Review
63
USA Today Claudia Puig
Though the lead performances are uniformly good, the film seems hazy in its focus from the start. Many of the scenes seem to simply meander.
Read Full Review
58
Portland Oregonian Marc Mohan
It's not a political film, but it's also not a bland recitation of homilies about the honor of serving one's country. It's a jokey road movie, in which three soldiers heading home from Iraq are forced into a cross-country van ride together.
Read Full Review
55
NPR Bob Mondello
There's something centrally pat and predictable about the coincidence-laden story, and by the time they get to Vegas, The Lucky Ones has been all but done in by a surfeit of serendipity.
Read Full Review
50
Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips
The film itself, which has everything from erection jokes to a computer-generated tornado, comes down to a battle between the interpreters and a screenplay riddled with convenience, cliche and well-meaning contrivance.
Read Full Review
50
Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten
More than a story about Iraq war veterans, The Lucky Ones is a movie about carefully considering one's options.
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50
The Hollywood Reporter Sura Wood
This moderately engaging, offbeat film requires a patience that audiences haven't demonstrated recently for stories concerning the fate of soldiers at home or abroad.
Read Full Review
50
Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker
Burger is so respectful of the trio that he never gets under their skin. Apart from the generosity of strangers who pay tribute to the soldiers with little acts of kindness, you get the same generic observations of any road movie.
Read Full Review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen
If this is meant to look fresh while still being sensitive, it doesn't and it isn't.
Read Full Review
50
Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer
About the only thing I like about this movie is its shaggy, relatively apolitical stance. Instead of setting itself up as a brief for or against the Iraq war, it just moseys along without much on its mind except how to connect the dots in the plot.
Read Full Review
50
San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub
As the film meanders, the powerful moments barely outnumber the ridiculous. And another excellent performance from McAdams isn't quite good enough to mask the distractions.
Read Full Review
40
Variety Todd McCarthy
It's hard to find the genuine heartfelt moments in The Lucky Ones.
Read Full Review
40
Village Voice Vadim Rizov
Its hopelessly schematic road-trip arc (bond-fight-reconcile-repeat) grows increasingly tedious.
Read Full Review
30
Washington Post Ann Hornaday
Could be filed under "wacky misfire."
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25
New York Post Kyle Smith
Cheap, ignorant, tone-deaf and condescending, but what's strangest about it is that it actually thinks it's pro-soldier even as it portrays vets home on leave as foolish (Rachel McAdams), desperate (Tim Robbins) and dishonorable (Michael Pena) while playing all three situations for laughs.
Read Full Review

What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 6.6 (out of 10) based on 5 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

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