Written by Shelby-Liza Ndumbi
Welcome back, Cupcakes!
This is Sunday Cream where I’ll be giving my likes and dislikes/hate of movies I’ve recently finished... after three days or two weeks.
If you haven’t read my first entry, it will be posted under ‘Sunday Cream’. Last time I spoke about The Outsider with Jared Leto aka Joker’s double with all its intentional character silence.
Once again on Sunday, God’s Day, I choose to talk about the 2006 movie starring Lindsay Lohan and Chris Pine called Just My Luck.
Oh, we’re in for a good one.
There will be spoilers.
Let me start off by saying I didn’t hate the movie, fair enough, but I did rock back and forth between good and bad. The film is really from its time. I’m not one to say that things are cheesy, or cliché, but this one was.
There were some moments I questioned what the hell are these characters doing?
Just My Luck is about a Manhattan woman named Ashley Albright (Lindsay Lohan) who’s described as the luckiest person in the world, yet *gasp a chance encounter with the world’s unluckiest man, Jake Hardin (Chris Pine) at a masquerade bash party caused Fate to swap her luck with his non-existent one. And in order to get it back they must... hangout? Kiss again?
I’m probably misunderstanding the concept of the movie presenting me with the life of a lucky person and the life of a misfortune, yet I watched the movie because Lohan and Pine were in it.
You’d think that Pine voicing Jack Frost in Rise of the Guardians 2012, one of the most popular DreamWorks characters, best animated film and personal favorite + The Princess Diaries 2: A Royal Engagement 2004 combined with Lohan’s Freaky Friday 2003, Mean Girls 2004, and Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen 2004 (with Megan Fox) would give me anticipation.
I loved each of those movies. They were so much fun!
If I’m being honest, I did genuinely laugh at moments like: Ashley tripping into another character's art piece which really looked like someone was taking a dump from an unknown location and releasing it in front of the other gallery guests. How about when Ashley sprays some All-Purpose cleaner on herself after retreating from the men’s washroom? I can relate. Or how much one of the members from a band Jake Hardin manages called ‘McFly’ (really?) resembled Louie from One Direction and the other one like Jesse McCartney.
They gave me Backstreet Boys, One Direction, Youngstown. All boy bands mind you.
I laughed way more watching this film than the last one in the prior entry.
One of the things I liked about this movie is the connection between Ashley and Jake. It was adorable and present for the audience to really see how affection is introduced. Something The Outsider didn’t do.
When Chris Pine plays a character, his eyes show so much emotion and depth that you’re convinced of whichever expression he’s emoting. Love. Sadness. Anger. Maybe even a bit of jealousy. He knows how to show it to us.
During most of the shots in the film, Jake’s eyes reveal real and unsubtle interest in Ashley, and it brings me warmth. True warmth.
But to go back to the question I asked about what the hell are these characters doing? There was an entire montage where after Ashley lost her luck, she, Maggie and Dana, her friends, were helping her find who stole it at the masquerade by kissing a bunch of strangers, which they somehow had each of their headshots. Okay...
I stopped wondering once it finished. My confusion was too high that I almost self-combusted.
The laundry bubble scene when she tried to use the washing machine while unlucky at Jake’s new apartment was both so a Lindsay Lohan movie and predictable because I knew something soap related would happen.
Something else I wrote off as cliché was how Fate was seen to me as a trickster going from Jake to Ashley over and over.
Especially towards the end of the film when Ashley left a celebration party for the band
McFly after giving Jake her luck, she was at the train station planning on seeing her parents.
Jake finds her and convinces her not to leave since he doesn’t care for luck because he has Ashley, they kiss multiple times and while that is happening, the train schedule goes bonkers.
In Time. Delayed. In Time. Delayed. Was what you kept seeing. *cough cough. Stop this.
Second point, and it’s the shortest one, the masquerade bash. Normally you would expect the party when there’s at least 40 minutes left. Yet this one happened much earlier into the film, it caught me off guard.
I was perplexed really.
They did something different than other films around this similar realm, so I’m not upset by it. For now...
Third, I can’t give props to the dialogue. It felt clunky most of the time. I’m not going to write exactly what the characters said, so here you go.
Examples of scenes: Conversations between Jake and Damon Philips (record director) in the recording studio and outside. Maggie, Dana and Ashley’s chats about dumb luck, kissing, boys and so on. Ashley in jail. Twice. Both punches were weird and not the fun-type of weird.
Side thought: I see Cruella De Vil in Missi Pyle who’s also in this movie. Anyone else? I’m sure some of you noticed. I’m just late...
Scene from: A Cinderella Story: Once Upon A Song (with Lucy Hale)
Scene from: 101 Dalmatians 1961
I am; however, going to applaud them for the music. I liked the songs McFly was playing.
The one they sing during sound check at the beginning of the movie is a good listen.
The reviews on IMBD and Rotten Tomatoes weren’t great, but I’m giving it a 7/10.
Note: These upcoming Sundays (Dec 5 & 12) there will be a gap between, so I can find new things to write about. I do have one idea ready...
You can comment below with your reactions.