Logan Lucky made me laugh out loud. A lot. A grifter tale with teeth that is funny? That's what we have here.
Steven Soderbergh's cinematic return has flavor to burn, hilarity in nearly every scene, and moves like a race car built for entertainment. Perfectly placed in the middle of August, this redneck caper will help movie lovers take their foot off the stress pedal for a couple hours.
What's it all about? Remember Soderbergh's dazzling film, Ocean's Eleven? Well, transport the viewers to North Carolina, sub in a race track for a casino, and you have Logan Lucky. This is the scrappy version of that film with similarly good looking stars but under the disguise of wildly eccentric accents, bleached hair, and a heavy portion of dirt.
Channing Tatum and Adam Driver are brothers who have suffered an unfortunate fate thus far in their lives: Tatum's Jimmy Logan is a former high school football star whose life was derailed by a knee injury and can't keep a job; Driver's Clyde Logan is a war hero who lost a limb during his service and now tends a small bar in town. Jimmy's daughter holds his head up, while Clyde is a simple-minded man who seems to be drifting through the motions. When the opportunity for a heist comes along, Jimmy knows what has to be done and assembles his own ragtag group of thieves.
Daniel Craig's Joe Bang is the first call. An explosives expert serving a stint in jail, the Logan brothers need him to make a certain thing go boom. Craig lovingly chews scenery in a role that film fans haven't seen him play with in quite some time. This is the Craig who was more of a daredevil performer in movies like Road to Perdition and Layer Cake, before he became a superstar with the James Bond films. Adopting an unhinged accent that borders on Southern but takes a corner into gypsy speak, Craig is the standout of this film.
Tatum and Driver are both very good, with the former putting together quite the portfolio with Soderbergh as an actor/director team. Tatum has the versatile skill set to be a hearthrob, everyman, and comedic utility guy all in one film, and he does it all here as a man hellbent on fixing the wrongs in his life by breaking bad. Like Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Tatum has confidence and charisma to spare on screen, which makes him a dual threat in movies ranging from 21 Jump Street to Magic Mike to The Hateful Eight.
Driver gets in bed with eccentric characters often in his films, and Clyde has just the right amount of quirk to spin a take on a guy looking to help his brother out and possibly improve his own life.
Soderbergh mixes in female firepower like Riley Keough, Katie Holmes, Farrah Mackenzie to balance out the testosterone, with Keough's Logan sister making quite an impression as a woman with more resources than any of the men. That's always fun to watch.
Seth McFarlane and Sebastian Stan make the most out of a little screen time, and Dwight Yoakam gives Bob Gunton a run for his money in greatest cinematic prison warden ever. Hilary Swank has a small yet pivotal role that may leave the door open for a sequel.
Soderbergh, working from a script by Rebecca Blunt (a newcomer who apparently rocks this fake name to keep her cover), mixes thrills, laughs, and action very well. The pacing of Logan Lucky is so good that you never look at your watch, but you do leave the theater wanting a little more.
How do you leave an audience wanting more from a two hour film? Create something authentic that doesn't make people's head hurt and shows off a particular impressive genre mastery. No one can make a better caper film than Soderbergh. Just watch the Ocean movies or Out of Sight. Instead of the shiny and pretty George Clooney and Brad Pitt talking like themselves, Logan Lucky gets well known names and shapes them differently with weird speaking tones.
Logan Lucky has a wild personality and that makes it very fun to watch. And, I laughed very hard at several scenes which weren't shown in the trailer. A bit about Game of Thrones may take the cake. So funny and easy going.
I'd like Steven Soderbergh to stop this retiring nonsense and just keep making slick and fun caper films. He's tackled Vegas and North Carolina. Now it's time to go to England or Australia.
