Saw "21" today. The movie loosely based on the MIT blackjack team.

My critique:
Kate Bosworth is hot.
Vegas cinematography was cool and production values were good.
Old school "knee breakin" in the basement - not believable (takes place in modern times).
Subplots were very cliché and didn't need to be there. (Don't want to give anything away, ha ha

In general it was mildly entertaining. Somewhat better than "Lucky-You".

It would have been much better and more interesting if they were truer to the book "Bringing down the house", than adding all the Hollywood bs.

I'd give it (out of 10) just for the cool LV scenes (book'n my flight today!)

Haven't seen it yet but probably will eventually.

Interesting that you thought they took too much dramatic license compared with the book. Because I remember thinking [along with several knowledgeable blackjack card-counters] that the book itself already took too much dramatic license.
On the BJ21 site the book got mostly panned because of how unrealistic it was. For example, I believe in the book they don't have a losing session until page 150 or something. Some of it really was pretty ridiculous.

And I definitely expect the movie to be ultra-ridiculous but still perhaps enjoyable for whatever action and Las Vegas stuff in there.

Should also be interesting to see how they portray card-counting because in the commercial they seem like they are grabbing the kid-genius to do this and relaly card-counting is NOT about memorizing every card of a 6-deck shoe or any RainMan type talents like that. It's really pretty damn easy.

Will also be interested to see how the popularity of trying to count cards by total idiots increases and if people try to do it on games with continuous shuffle-machines or 6:% BJ payouts or other games that any knowledgeable BJ player would stay away from or at least understand the differences.

this is correct

This is so true. I was thinking to myself - let's see I think my 10 year old nephew could add and subtract by 1 - you don't need to be some MIT hyper-genius to do this.

Of course, they are trying to appeal to the masses. So they must insert all the typical clichéd characters (Kevin Spacey being his typical snake-oil salesman self) and way overused sports/gambling/grifter subplots.
Definitely a popcorn movie and Vegas travelogue. I went to the matinee - so it was worth the 5 bucks!

Also, (spoiler alert?)


Professor Spacey uses the ol "Lets Make a Deal, 2 goats and a car," riddle in what appears to be an advanced mathematics class. I'm sure his senior MIT students would have rolled their eyes and laughed him out of the room. This kind of set the sophistication level for the entire movie.

going tonight. hoping Kevin Spacey & Lawrence Fishburne are worth $8.50

It's not something that anybody could do. From what I remember to even get on the team you had to be able to count down a deck in 60 seconds or something? Add to that they'd do practice runs in makeshift casinos and if you ****ed up you were out.

I'm pretty sure this movie is based on Andy Bloch and his MIT crew

wasn't the book based on an Asian kid?

I agree with Microbob although I probably won't see this movie unless it's on cable one day.

Counting cards doesn't take a mathematical genius. The only genius involved was Ed Thorpe's discovery of the system.

I saw a commercial where "blackjack pros" were laughing and saying, "hahha I always see people reading the book on the way to Vegas, hahaha, that's not how it works, hahaha." I was quite puzzled. You could teach a reasonably intelligent person in less than 15 minutes.

It was a group of kids that employed Edward Thorpe's theories. Edward Thorpe was the original inventor who only minimally used the system therefore it was under the radar until the group of students took it to a very large operation.

as an MIT student, I was thoroughly underwhelmed

So Hollywood is determined to never allow an asian to play a non comedy/karate role?

Thanks OP for starting this thread. I was going to see it but now I'm thinking I wont since it doesn't seem like it has a super strong connection with "bringing down the house". I think you could take either one of mezrich's titles about 21 and turn it into an awesome movie but I'm glad to see hollywood probably had more creative control than the author.

MasterLJ, this movie is based on "bringing down the house" the book by ben mezrich. In the book the lead character is an asian kid from MIT. You're right you could learn the simple hi/lo system in a single deck game in probably 15 minutes or less. However, actually using the system in a 6-8 deck game correctly under vegas conditions is very difficult IMO.

I agree that no one in a seniors MIT class knowing the Monty Hall Solution was pretty funny, but overall I thought the movie was semi-entertaining, Bosworth is on fire, but would never watch it again or really advocate anyone seeing it. I do advocate reading the book though. Great read.

A 60 second countdown would be extremely slow. More like 20 seconds I would guess. I could teach an 8 year old to count down a deck in 60 seconds.

The movie looks terrible.

I haven't seen it...but the preview made me laugh. Specifically, when they were doing a fast showing of various "hand signals" that would be used to direct the team to and from the table.

One of the signals involved a girl crossing both hands behind her back quite obviously.

It was pretty lame, as I doubt any signal would be THAT obvious.

Some of you guys are making this sound a little too easy. It's one thing to count cards from the comfort of your own home, its quite another while sitting at a table in a casino. There are a lot of things going on and it would be easy to get distracted. I remember them talking about carrying on conversations while counting etc. The beauty of what they did is that they could count cards effortlessly and blend in as just a lucky tourist.

I'm sure they took plenty of poetic license & I won't see it until it hits HBO in six months but this specific quote reminded me that sometimes the most unbelievable things happen (Not this though).

If you get a chance read up on Ron Harris & his involvement with the Nevada Gaming Control Board. While the whole story is a great read (Discovery did a two hour show also); what he accomplished in Atlantic City with the Keno game was amazing (& stupid too). While he deciphered the algorithm that generated the 'random' numbers for the game, even he thought it would take some time to hit all eight numbers on one card (230,000/1). He hit all eight correct numbers with his first purchase. Like the Absolute 'superuser', Harris had a license to steal & if done correctly would never have been caught.

Greed.

the people that say "it's not that hard etc etc" sound exactly like the people that say "it's easy to beat 400NL, so many donks, play solid, etc."

the reality is that it is that most people could not, in practice, successfully count cards in a group like the MIT team did whenver they did it.

sure, there are people that could do it, probably a lot of people from this board could, but making it sound like it's so easy anyone could do it is just wrong. i do think that just about anyone could be taught HOW to do it, though.

tc

The signal they used in the book I think was strecthing or something simialr and touching one's hair was a singal to leave. They used codewords at the table to give the new member the current count (Voting booth=18 since in the US you need to be 18 to vote)

The book is based on a team that was running at the same time the one Andy was on was running. If you read the book the main character has an argument with another counter, that guy was on Andy's team IIRC.

Basic counting is easy and does not require the scenario of "You were born for this because you're the next Good Will Hunting" that the commercial portrayed. He's supposed to be the smartest kid at MIT this he can actually count cards. Way more people than 'whiz kid at MIT' could do that. That's my gripe.

If I'm reasonably practiced and get out of poker mode [where I always see AA and want to raise instead of thinking 'oh wait, I should split those'] then I can count cards and take my eyes of the table so the pit is pretty oblivious and also sing to whatever song is being played over the system or chat up the dealer or somebody else at the table or order another drink, etc etc.
And I would usually side-count aces, 5's and then whatever other card there was a quick abundance of or lack of in the early going of the shoe or deck [so if a bunch of 8's came out early I would notice that and pay attention to it and could alter some close decisions such as splitting 3's or 2's or something like that where an 8 is a valuable card].

I admit that not everyone could do it how I do and that they would practically have to do it with their lips moving to successfully do the +1 and -1 thing.
And I also know there are more complicated counting systems out there that might include a +2 for 5's or even some +0.5's, etc etc.
But it's still hardly genius level.

And to do basic counting and use signals as I understand the MIT team and the movie to use REALLY doesn't take some super math-geniuses.

The book itself was pretty ridiculous. And it's my hunch that movie is even moreso. But I'll probably watch it at some point because it does look pretty slickly done. I'm just hoping it doesn't aggrevate me TOO much. But knowing me I'll probably be cringing at the sillyness through the whole thing.

I definitely can't go see this when I'm in a bad mood or I may get the urge to kill somebody.

you don't have to be a math genius to beat MSNL+ poker, but most people can't do it. i didn't mean you have to be a (math) genius to be at the level of card counting the MIT teams were, but it's just not something most people could do. this is coming from having had talks with someone on one of the old teams, btw, and having him talk me through exactly what went through it while we were watching a BJ table.

tc

The asian community seems to be upset that there were no asian actors in the movie.

I'm sure the team stuff they were doing was more complicated. Especially if it involved a higher level count and/or shuffle-tracking and such stuff.
Just that the 'MIT internet whiz-kid who is smart enough to actually beat Vegas!!" thing they do kind of ticks me off.
It obviously doesn't take the very smartest of the smart in order to do that. You don't need to have the last 58 cards memorized in order.
Some people think that card-counting really is that crazy and the commercials for the movie lead one to believe that they are practically trying to take advantage of that image.
They definitely portray it in the commercial like you have to be a high-level mathematics god in order to count-down a 6-deck shoe.

Basic counting is pretty easy.
The stuff the MIT team did was way more than just the basic stuff. But still not the end-all-be-all of math-genius and if people get that kind of wrong impression from the movie, which I suspect they may just from people telling me their thoughts about it just from the commercial, then that's something I have a problem with.