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today’s video the movie we are going to talk about is called jackpot
we will

talk about what this movie is and where you can watch it all the
interesting facts about this movie in today’s to

video I am going to tell you I am also going to give you all the
information on which a platform or on which satellite

channel you will get to watch this movie also we will talk in detail
about the

technical department music department pre-production filming
post-production

budget box office collection of this film we will also talk about
the story

of this film and I will also give you a small review of the story of
this film

apart from this we will discuss about the facts of this film
storyline star

cast actor’s performance in the film and which character has played
which role

that’s why I request you friends to watch this video till the end so
let’s start the video jackpot is a 2024

American action comedy film directed by Paul and written by Rob yum
the film

stars Aquafina John Cena Iden myy Donald Elise Watkins Sam asgari
and simu Leu

the film follows Katie Aquafina a former child actor who wins a 3.6
billion

Lottery and must fend off people trying to kill her in a future
version of California Amazon Studios began

developing the film under the title Grand death lotto in March 2023
Aquafina Cena and the rest of the

cast was announced and filming began the same month jackpot was
released by

Amazon MGM Studios through Prime video on August 15th 2024 the film
received generally mixed

reviews from critics movie plot by 2030 the financially desperate
government of

California creates the deadly Grand Lottery each Lottery day the
randomly

selected winner must survive until sundown anyone with a losing
ticket can kill the winner to claim the

multi-million dollar prize instead but no one may use guns former
child actor

Katie Kim arrives in Los Angeles with hopes of re-entering Show
Business unaware of the lottery and its record

$3.6 billion jackpot renting a room from money hungry shatty and her
boyfriend dj

Katie attends a disappointing audition and inadvertently enters and
wins the lottery attacked on site by everyone

around her she is soon found by NL Cassidy a freelance Lottery
protection agent who offers his services in

exchange for for 10% of her winnings fighting off dozens of Katie’s
murderous

fans using non-lethal means NL and Katie Escape in his car and he
explains that a

drone tracking Katie will post her location every 14 minutes but she
can officially quit The Lottery by reaching

the grape vine on the outskirts of the city unwilling to trust null
Katie

realizes that even the police want to kill her and flees on foot a
sympathetic

security guard lets her hide inside a wack Museum but a phone call
from shatty leads her and DJ to Katie’s location she

escapes and is rescued by null pursued by shatty DJ and a
sightseeing Bus full

of tourists they drive to MGK’s mansion and commandeer his Panic
Room shooting

him with tranquilizer darts and NL assures Katie of his commitment
to helping her shatty coerces MGK to give

up the Panic rooms passcode forcing null to call in a favor with the
Lewis protection AG agency before the mob can

break in the LPA short circuits their phones and drives Katie and NL
to safety

at alpa’s high-tech facility Katie meets Louis Lewis the head of the
agency who

agrees to protect her in exchange for the LPA and null each
receiving 30% of

the prize money NL reveals that he and Louie are the sole survivors
of a team

of mercenaries and NL uses his protection earnings to support the
families of their fallen comrades

Katie is given an elaborate prosthetic disguise and prepares to be
driven to safety but null suspects that the LPA

has been murdering their clients keeping the winners Anonymous and
claiming their winnings he allows the crowd of fans

into the facility allowing Katie to drive away alone and is captured
by Louie before Katie can reach the

Grapevine Louie calls threatening to kill NL unless she surrenders
Louie

brings NL to an abandoned theater admitting that he killed their
fellow mercenaries to keep a stash of gold for

himself Katie arrives and forces Louie to spare null by threatening
to kill herself and forfeit the jackpot live

streaming on her phone as proof the live stream summons Katie’s fans
and she and

null fight off the mob and the LPA cornered by Louie high above the
stage

Katie manages to kill him with his own grenades but falls from the
scaffolding

however she is caught by a crowd of genuine and fans who have
arrived to help just as the lottery deadline Runs

Out She and NL celebrate her Victory six months later Katie and NL
have used her

prize money to open a variety of businesses and nonprofits including
their own protection agency that guards

lottery winners for free mid credit scenes reveal that they have
bought a super yacht acknowledging that money has

changed them while MGK orders an improved Panic Room and more darts
and

the Grand Lottery prepares to expand across the country cast
Aquafina as

Katie John Cena as null Iden Mary as shatty Donald Elise Watkins as
DJ Donald

Sam asgari as senior agent Ash Coulson Baker as himself simu Leu as
Louie Lewis

seen William Scott as rugged Man Maran green as lunch lady Rosanna
Scot as news

anchor Dolly Delon as grandma tala Murray Hill as Johnny Grand Becky
Anne Baker as

sweet Irene Adam Ray as dad Monique ganderton as aent hoit Bobby Lee

as himself production in March 2023 it was announced that an action
comedy film

titled Grand death Lotto was in development at Amazon Studios Paul
fig

had been hired to direct written by Rob yescome and produced by Joe
Roth Jeff

kersin bound fig and Laura Fischer John Cena Zack Roth and yum
served as

executive producers Cena Aquafina and Sim Leu were cast in the main
roles Iden

Mary seen William Scott Dolly dilon and Donald Elise Watkins joined
the cast

later in the month principal photography began in March 2023 at
Shadowbox studios

in Atlanta Georgia release jackpot was released by Amazon MGM
Studios through

Prime video on August 15th 2024 reception on the review aggregator

website Rotten Tomatoes 32% of 50 critics reviews are positive with
an

average rating of 4 610 Metacritic which uses a weighted average
assigned the

film a score of 42 out of 100 based on 18 critics indicating mixed
or average

reviews Jack jackpot movie review jackpot is a trashy and repetitive

action comedy about greed and bloodlust set in a world full of
people who are proud to be awful directed by Paul

spy it’s set in near future Los Angeles which begins to seem like a
statement in

itself as the movie goes along there’s a Statewide lottery for some
reason the

state government has decreed that citizens are permitted to hunt and
kill winners to try and take their prize

money a handful of rules govern the hunt one is only those who’ve
purchased a

ticket and lost the draw can take part another rule is no guns
allowed a third

is the hunt can only go on for 24 hours if the original winner has
survived at

the end of that period they get to keep their winnings other than
that anything

goes participants can use knives clubs broken bottles bats chains
rubber hoses

Spears curtain rods mop handles and presumably automobiles though I
don’t

recall anyone trying to run anyone down deliberately which seems
like a strange Omission in retrospect they can hunt

alone or in groups even very large groups Aquafina plays the target
of the

latest hunt Katie Kim a former actress who just returned home from
many years

spent visiting her dying mother in another state her dad died a
while before she didn’t have a good relation

reltionship with either parent we get a bit of detail about her
personal life to explain why she doesn’t know anything

about the California State Lottery turning into a murderous Manhunt
she’s been spending time with her mom no

really that’s the reason and also why she’s worthy of our sympathy
beyond the fact that like other past lottery

winners she doesn’t deserve to be hunted like an animal nobody does
Katie comes

into her own winning ticket purely by accident and doesn’t realize
she has it until until her number comes up during

an audition which she doesn’t get and everybody starts looking at
her like a cartoon wolf staring at a lamb and

imagining lamb chops an entire economy seems to have grown up around
the lottery hunt though the movie only zeros

in on one part the Security Experts who locate winners and offer
them protection

from harm in exchange for a cut of their Fortune John Cena plays one
such

security guard a lovable Bruiser named NL he used to work for a very
successful

Lottery security company run by a snotty badass named Lou Lewis
simio he saves

Katie from Death after the audition when everyone in the building
including other actresses and a gymnasium full of karate

students have turned on her she studied stage fighting but didn’t
learn a lot

her instincts are good but she lacks the moves to survive without
null she’d be

dead meat and without Katie NL would be just another square jaw he
man he’s got

a backstory of course which Katie will gradually pry out of him
written by Rob

yescome whose prior work was mainly on video games jackpot doesn’t
make a lick

of real world sense and it’s not supposed to it has a video game
like repetitiousness and gradual escalation

leading to a big boss Showdown there’s a lot of obviously improvised
comedy that

sometimes lands but more often feels like somebody filmed the
exercises in a comedy performance Workshop it’s all in

service of a movie that’s more half-baked goof than full-blown
satire and it seems committed to not

investigating the deeper implications of the scenario it’s
presenting in which the lottery Hunt is The Logical

outgrowth of a society that seems to have completely given up on
modeling decent values and has decided instead to

monetize the worst human behavior when Katie rents a tiny room from
a website

and realizes when she gets there that it doesn’t look anything like
the pictures online the young woman who rents it

appropriately named shatty Iden myy chirps we used fake photos
because who’s

going to stay here if we don’t early in the movie Katie sees a
hateful stage dad

loudly and profanely griping about his young daughter who just
failed an audition sorry for all the bad words he

tells the kid I only curse when your mom’s being a fgbh ace
character actress Becky Anne

Baker gives us a glimpse of what the movie could have become in her
brief performance as a lady who seems gentle

and kind but is anything but she captures the professional Predators
self-satisfied inward smirk at fooling

somebody who trusts them a marrow deep rottenness that is expressed
through fleeting glimmers in the eyes and that

is visible only to people who know what to look for but with a few
exceptions

the movie’s way shallower than its best character moments we don’t
know what the state gets out of letting people hunt

lottery winners as in The Purge series it seems on its face as if
the cleanup

required the next day would outweigh whatever value the exercise has
in collectively permitting a society to let

off some steam but this is frankly not the kind of movie where you
are supposed to think anything except that was a

pretty funny line or that looks like that must have hurt or cool
stunt there

are seeds here that could have flowered into an audacious action
comedy perhaps perhaps in the vein of Robocop or the

Running Man or Battle Royale I kept thinking of that last one
throughout

jackpot because unlike jackpot it’s so cynical that it has moved
Beyond

bitterness and into a kind of Blas matter of fness and also because
it has an actual Vision rather than a notion

and the action is imaginatively framed lit choreographed and edited
an area of

film making that has never been Fig’s strength or honestly one of
his main areas of Interest though spy had its

Kick-Ass moments such as the kitchen fight the two stars have good
chemistry

they seem to genuinely enjoy being around each other but there’s
nothing in the script that challenges either of

them in the way that James gun challenged Cena in two genuinely
special superhero projects The Suicide Squad and

Peacemaker or that Lulu Wang challenged Aquafina in the farewell for
the most

part this is a lacad isical project that that is an example of the
coarse ins sensibilities it’s making fun of as is

often the case with improv driven movies the outtakes that play
during the end credits are more natural and pleasurable

than the movie jackpot is a 2024 American action comedy directed by
Paul

and penned by Rob yescome a film that boasts an intriguing premise
but

unfortunately falls short of its potential set in the not so distant
future with a state ravished by the ID

iotic socialist policies of its leadership High inflation poor
living conditions sound familiar the story

imagines a world where winning the lottery isn’t just about instant
wealth but about surviving the day as well it’s

a novel idea ripe for both tension and laughs yet the film struggles
to fully

deliver on either front The Narrative centers around Katie Kim a
struggling

actress played by the ever charismatic Aquafina who unexpectedly
wins The Grand

lottery in California the twist California’s new law states that
anyone

holding a losing ticket can legally murder the winner before Sundown
and claim the jackpot it’s a deliciously

dark concept that sets the stage for a wild ride across Los Angeles
think a light-hearted version of The Purge with

Katie forced to team up with NL Cassidy an amateur Lottery
protection agent played by John Cena together they must

Dodge a myriad of quirky dangerous and out right bizarre assassins
all eager to

cash in on Katie’s billion dooll prize Aquafina shines in the role
of Katie

bringing her trademark wit and relatability to a character who feels
out of her depth but determined to

survive her chemistry with John Cena’s null is one of the film’s few
consistent

Delights Cena playing the tough but Goofy protector is clearly in
his element and his physicality adds a layer

of authenticity to the action sequences their partnership albeit
predictable is

engaging and they make for an entertaining Duo as they navigate the
perilous streets of Los Angeles special

shout out to John Cena’s makeup and hair team they are doing
Miracles with that

thinning thatch simu Leu cast as nl’s slick rival Lou Lewis provides
a

compelling foil to Cena’s character however despite his undeniable
screen

presence Liu’s talents are somewhat underutilized with his role
feeling more like an obligatory antagonist rather

than a fully fleshed out character The Supporting Cast including
Iden Mary as

The Eccentric shatty Donald Elise Watkins as the DJ turned hacker
Donald

and Sam asgari as the non-nonsense senior agent Ash all add color to
the film but are often sidelined by the

Relentless pace of the plot Bobby Lee’s Cameo as himself is a brief
but memorable moment injecting a bit of

self-aware humor into the mix visually jackpot impresses with its
well

choreographed action scenes and creative set pieces Paul Fig’s
Direction ensures

that the film moves at a Brisk Pace with moments of genuine suspense
as Katie and NL evade their pursuers the

cinematography captures the sun soaked yet perilous streets of Los
Angeles and the futuristic touches B minimal are

enough to sell the near future setting without overwhelming the
story however

where jackpot stumbles is in its comedic elements for a film
marketed as an

action comedy it surprisingly lacks the sharp humor one would expect
from a fague directed project the jokes often

fall flat and the attempts at satire feel half-hearted leaving the
audience yearning for the biting wit or clever

dialogue that could have elevated the film it’s clear that much of
the humor relies on improvisation particularly

from Aquafina and Cena but without a strong script to back them up
even their

best efforts can’t quite land the punch lines the film also suffers
from a sense

of predictability with the plot unfolding in a rather formulaic
manner it’s as if the movie was crafted by an

algorithm ticking off boxes for Action tension and comedy but
missing the soul

that makes such a story truly engaging there’s an underlying sense
that jackpot

could have been more a sharper script A tighter narrative and a
stronger commitment to its comedic Roots might

have made it a standout in the genre was the script literally
written by AI after

inputting a few prompts jackpot is a film that tantalizes with its
concept

But ultimately underwhelms in execution Aquafina and John Cena do
their best to

breathe life into their roles and there are moments of genuine
excitement but the film’s lackluster humor and by the

Numbers storytelling prevent it from hitting the jackpot it’s so
clearly a spot Ires to be with a score of 5 out of

10 jackpot is a missed opportunity delivering a moderately
entertaining

experience that Fades from memory as quickly as it plays out on
screen other

information about this film the ceiling’s pretty low on the action
comedy category a genre whose biggest

hits tend to Pepper anemic shootouts with Wise Cracks from former
Saturday Night Live stars with Prime video entry

jackpot director Paul switches up the formula crafting stunt
intensive set

pieces where the action itself makes you laugh that could mean
anything from Aquafina Hiding Out Among the wax

figures of a tacky Hollywood museum to the sight of ex- wrestler
John Cena taking on a room of black belts with the

crazy Rich Asians breakout strapped to his back why are people
trying to kill

Aquafina jackpot asks audiences to buy into a clever but often
illogical

premise about a radical rule change to the California lottery in the
year 2030

the winning ticket comes with a price the money is only yours to
keep if you can stay alive till sundown in the

meantime winners must navigate an impromptu Hunger Games on the
streets of Los Angeles in which their winnings

double as a sort of bounty awarded to whoever’s crafty enough to
kill them no

offense to Rob yum who was named one of variety’s screenwriters to
watch last year but that idea is about as far as he

got in in a sloppy screenplay that’s otherwise propped up by
whatever improv the cast could bring and surprisingly

funny fight scenes shows how the states Win Lose Or Die Lottery
works

right out of the gate as that day’s winner scen William Scott tries
to outrun a greedy mob the rules seem

pretty straightforward which makes it hard to swallow that Aquafina
doesn’t know what’s going on when her number is

drawn the comic plays it equal parts orary and oblivious as Katie
Kim a

former child actor who’s not crazy about having to perform again but
has no other

choice after her deadbeat stage Dad ran off with all her earnings
during her

first amusingly humiliating audition she discovers the winning
ticket in her pocket accidentally activates it with

her thumb and the next thing she knows she’s become an instant
celebrity the most valuable person in all of La lucky

for her a freelance bodyguard named NL Cena bursts through the wall
like a muszle bound cool-aid man and starts

knocking heads he’s the near future equivalent of an ambulance
chasing lawyer and a welcome Ally in helping

Katie avoid her fans as the movie calls them turns out not everyone
wants to

kill her but like any good talent agent this guy expects a 10%
commission there

are traces running all through jackpot of a more pointed Hollywood
satire as if

yum or or someone along the way want wanted to skewer Americans
obsession with becoming rich and famous weirdly

enough Katie doesn’t want either she didn’t buy the ticket but found
it in a borrowed pair of gold lame sweat pens

stranger still the movie seems to have landed on the word weird at
the same moment that VP candidate Tim Walls made

it the insult dour adding an unexpected resonance to some of the
movies weaker

Jabs jackpot demands a trickier kind of physical comedy than aqua F
has been

asked to deliver before and even though her character is supposed to
read as clumsy and incompetent it takes

considerable skill to pull off the routines that action
choreographer James Young has in store for her given his WWE

background Cena is far more accustomed to making fake fighting seem
entertaining but once again reminds of

his good sport sense of humor as the scene Steeler did earlier this
year in Ricky stanik 13 years ago struck

comedy gold with the Jud APO produced bridesmaids but he’s
subsequently been hit and miss trying to Edge his way into

other genres most recently with your fantasy flop the school for
good and evil fitting neatly between the Heat and

2016’s Ghostbusters reboot jackpot finds the Dapper director
squarely in his

comfort zone falling back on some of the tricks that worked so well
in Bridesmaids minus the underlying

relatability of that film’s brilliant screenplay the most obvious of
those strategies comes in casting which he

entrusts the secret weapon Allison Jones who’s been unearthing funny
people for him and APO as far back as Freaks and

Geeks it was Jones who brought Seth Roan and Melissa McCarthy into
the mix here

she delivers half a dozen diverse laugh out loud supporting Comics
to The Ensemble from Katie’s insensitive

homicidal airan host Iden Mary to the Shady leader of the Protection
Agency

simul Leu who’s looking to steal nl’s fee for himself she even
enlists Machine

Gun Kelly who proves a self-deprecating good sport in playing a
Panic Room ready

version of himself the jackpot script is full of twists few of which
will come as

a surprise so why spoil them here meanwhile that puts the burden on
how

well Aquafina and Company can punch up their scenes jackpot winds up
being one

of those movies where you can tell the actors tried dozens of jokes
and the editor went with the best ones although

the outtake loaded end credits suggest funnier options often existed
in a way

it’s fitting that Katie’s survival depends on how well she can think
on her feet considering how heavily the film

also relies on improvisation it’s that very skill that stands to
make Aquafina

a millionaire the convenience of watching a tacky flick from the
comfort of your couch without the few dozen Act

ads or overpriced popcorn often softens the blow of subpar Cinema
but not even

the most forgiving of streaming audiences could stomach Amazon
Prime’s latest attempt at an action comedy

jackpot which seems to have emerged fully formed from the smoldering
wreckage of a thousand better ideas the

latest addition to the digital Wasteland of forgettable streaming
content jackpot

attempts to revive the action comedy genre with its uninspired
slapstick dystopia

directed by Paul who guaranteed a certain level of comedic Ingenuity
in his earlier work this fresh Venture is a

shoddy Affair from start to finish seemingly cobbled together from
the detritus of The Purge and Squid game

unfortunately even bridesmaid’s Nostalgia isn’t quite enough to
salvage this pedestrian mess there’s a tragic

irony about jackpot being a film about the Perils of easy money when
it feels

like the script was written on the Fly ostensible for the same
motive the premise while not groundbreaking

certainly held the potential for some trashy fun the film is set in
a dystopian Los Angeles where the economy

has gone the way of the dodo and the only hope for the downtrod in
masses is the grand Lottery a multi-million dollar

jackpot that comes with a rather macabra catch the winner must
survive until sundown while the rest of the city is

given cart blanch to hunt them down if the winner makes it through
the day they they get the jackpot if not the person

who kills them takes home the prize enter Katie Aquafina a washed up
child

star returning to Hollywood after caring for her sick mother a
series of increasingly improbable mishaps lands

her a winning lottery ticket and suddenly she’s the target of every
money hungry resident in the city her only

hope NL John Cena a musclebound protection agent who offers his
services

in exchange for a cut of the winnings the pair bumbles their way
through a series of increasingly absurd scenarios

from fending off crazed yoga instructors to navigating the waxy
Labyrinth of Madame tcads and perhaps most menacing

of all the script’s Relentless barrage of unfunny jokes aquaus Katie
is an odd

mix of naivity and smarts a character designed to be endearing in
her helplessness But ultimately annoying in

her lack of Common Sense watching her stumble from one PA parous
situation to another rarely without some ill-advised

quip or pop culture reference made watching her journey all the more
frustrating Aquafina has more than

proven her comedic chops but here her talents are abysmally
squandered on a character that lacks any real agency or

depth halfway through the chaos you find yourself not rooting for
her survival

but rather hoping she’ll find a quieter corner to hide in where we
can all be spared her innan banter see CA fars

slightly better but even his natural Charisma and knack for physical
comedy can’t Elevate jackpot above its middling

screenplay Cena’s null could have been a real Delight but the
writing consistently lets him down the jokes

rarely land and moments of genuine tension are undercut by poorly
timed gags and an over Alliance on Cena’s

imposing physicality in a more competently made film his role could
have been a Saving Grace while here it’s

nothing but yet another missed opportunity The Supporting Cast
including simu Leu as a shady corporate

security CEO does little to improve matters however hard he tries
Liu’s

character is a one-dimensional villain and then of course there’s
Machine Gun Kelly whose inexplicable Cameo only

serves to produce some disturbing rectal imagery and to remind us
how bgrade the

production really is the less said about that the better perhaps the
film’s most

laring flaw is how Fig’s Direction swings erratically between
chaotic action sequences and poorly time forced

humor creating a disjointed viewing experience the action is
frantically edited to the point of incoherence with

fight scenes that feel more like a flurry of Limbs making it hard to
follow who’s fighting who or what’s at stake

meanwhile the film’s attempts at satire are clumsy and superficial
leaving us with nothing more than a collection of

shallow Jabs at consum consumer culture by the time the credits roll
accompanied

by the obligatory blooper reel which turned out to be significantly
more entertaining jackpot ends up as yet

another forgettable streaming entry destined to be lost in the
algorithmic shuffle if you’re looking for a Mindless

way to kill a couple of hours there are far worse ways to spend your
time but only just more details in the Prime

video film jackpot the state of California implements a new new kind
of Lottery where the winner makes a

lifechanging amount of cash but only if they can stay alive within
the borders of Los Angeles until sundown The Twist

is that every other ticket holder can still claim the jackpot for
themselves if they can manage to kill the winner

within that time frame turning each Lotto drawing into a crazed
Citywide

Manhunt set in the 2030s when the US economy is worse than ever and
homeless

camps litter the streets jackpot has a log line that sounds like it
should come from a new Purge sequel or maybe a

lowbudget thriller that finally draws John Carpenter out of
retirement instead

it arrives as a loud crass and deeply unfunny comedy courtesy of
Bridesmaids

and Ghostbusters 2016 director Paul it’s tough to recall another
recent

example where a filmmaker and his material are so disastrously
mismatched and the end result is catastrophic for

everyone involved in Jackpot Aquafina plays Katie Kim a former child
actor who

returns to California to have another go at a Hollywood career after
her ailing mother who she had been caring for back

in Michigan passes away in the first of the film’s many senseless
contrivances

Katie isn’t even aware that the state has a new kind of Lottery that
activates the blood lust of nearly all of Los

Angeles so she’s completely befuddled when she accidentally
activates a ticket she finds in a borrowed piece of

clothing is declared the winner and suddenly finds herself being
attacked by almost every person she comes in contact

with all assaults are up close and personal as guns are banned by
the Lottery’s rules one of the few people

not trying to kill her is John Cena’s null a protection agent who
will work to

keep her alive until sundown for a standard 10% of her winnings a
very

confused Katie is reluctant to accept his offer at first but
eventually comes to rely on null espe once a bigger

shadier and much more corporate protection agency led by an old
military

buddy of nolles played by simu is drawn into their mad Scramble for
riches based

on that summation you might assume that jackpot turns into a bloody
gorist but

you’d be wrong the movie states its intentions in the first few
moments when the on-screen text that establishes the

film’s Universe and rules ends with some people call it dystopian
but the those

people are no fun working from a script by Rob yescome fig severely
downplays

the violent implications of the story to instead tell a light
Hollywood satire stuffed with jokes that range from

terrible there’s a character who’s a DJ named DJ to a life force
draining level

of dreadful at one point Machine Gun Kelly seemingly just playing
his current

day self even though the movie is set at least 6 years into the
future mistakenly

thinks Cena wants to have sex with him and says you would turn my
into the eye of saon so let’s not go on that

Fellowship of my ring an end of Movie blooper real reveals that
other equally

bad options were considered for that retort while also proving that
you can’t get away from jackpot as juvenile sex

jokes even once you’ve suffered through to the credits additionally
there are fart jokes Shar jokes the insinuation

that two supporting characters had sex with a wax Recreation of the
wizard of Oz’s tinman and a lame recurring bit

about how Cena’s character is unreasonably obsessed with the Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles if this is what

counts for fun I’ll happily trade it back in for a standard issue
gloomy dystopia please almost every aspect of

jackpot feels like a misfire either for tonal or story- based
reasons why a

lottery that includes the attempted murder of the winner proves to
be a bigger Money Maker than the regular

Lottery is never addressed and while I don’t disagree that culture
has stagnated it’s weird to see a movie

supposedly set in a more hellish near future continually dropping
lazy pop culture references in addition to the

TMNT thing and Machine Gun Kelly being around there are shout outs
to Star Wars

The Karate Kid the Kardashians and more it’s genuinely mystifying
even worse

it’s annoying early on in the movie Katie is forced to deal with a
ditsy air

renter named shatty Iden Mary who quickly makes a strong case for
being the most irritating and unwelcome

character in a film this year Cena and Leu the latter of whom must
be desperately waiting for Marvel to get

him back on the schedule end up in a screaming match about lacas
sparkling water at one point things aren’t much

better on the action side of this action comedy again it’s a story
choice to have

the film’s events play out as silly instead of violent because the
Lottery Commission has drones that follow Katie

around and Report her location at regular intervals she and NL are
constantly under attack by young punks

wannabe actors no so kindly grandmas and anyone else who’s within
grabbing

distance of a knife or Hatchet however Katie and NL two people the
movie

continually insists are among the few good people left in a world
gone mad refus to respond in kind typically

disarming and incapacitating their foes as pleasantly as possible at
one point

Cena puts a helmet on an attacker before tossing them out of their
moving vehicle because he doesn’t want them to sustain

a head injury Katie is surprisingly effective at fending off hordes
of greedy Maniacs although the movie’s

explanation that it’s because she once took a stunt fighting class
feels like everything else exceedingly flimsy the

fights themselves are slap sticky the kind of throw Downs you’d see
in a jackiechan film but without some someone

as skilled as Chan gracefully centering the action and holding the
frame the film’s ideas about the struggle to

remain a good person when times are bad and how the government will
play us all against each other for its own gain are

so simple basic and non-committal that no real thematic through line
is ever

able to emerge as a result jackpot could be looked at as an allegory
for fame and

instant stardom all the people trying to kill Katie to claim the
jackpot are labeled as fans and Katie’s face is

suddenly on every screen in the city but that feels inconsequential
and unprobed as well probably because the filmmakers

were more concerned about fitting in another couple of butthole
jokes all of this is to say Aquafina and Cena have

both done far better work elsewhere there are exactly two jokes here
that got me to faintly smile the first is

when Aquafina tells Cena he looks like a bulldog that a witch cast a
spell on and

turn turned into a human against his will pretty accurate that and
then near

the end of the movie Aquafina makes a crack about acting being a
worthless Endeavor as wrestlers and

YouTubers are movie stars now it’s an easy joke about her and Cena’s
more

humble Origins and it’s likely less clever than the best joke from
any randomly selected Deadpool scene but

considering the laugh free 90 plus minutes that preceded it this
moderately amusing self referential crack felt like

discovering an oasis after spending ages lost in the desert the
movie might be called jackpot but no one is leaving

this one a winner and homage to the great International action
comedy star from screenwriter rob yescom a video

game Rider designer now turning to the big screen this over-the-top
fenetic stew not only lacks Chan to make it hum

it also lacks any sense of credibility in order to keep us engaged
with its absurd premise

set in a decaying Los Angeles Atlanta subs for it in 2026 2 years
from now

when the filmmakers Apparently think America has gone to hell we are
introduced right from the start to the

Grand Lottery a contest that promises Untold riches to whoever can
survive

actually winning it and avoid being killed by the Rabid citizenry
but if they succeed in knocking you off within

24 hours they will get the money promised by your ticket think of it
as sort of a comedic Purge

thus rugged Man seen William Scott is in a battle for his life that
ends when a kindly older woman Dolly Delon succeeds

in offing him and thereby is greeted by Johnny Grand Murray Hill the
flashy MC

of the lottery who arrives at her doorstep with a check for $22
million cut to 2030 and the game is

still on this time for an unsuspecting former Child Star Katie
Aquafina who is

down and depressed by lack of acting roles and now only recognized
for an old spaghettio commercial as she arrives

back in Hollywood staying at an air Beany run by shatty Iden Mary
another

aspiring actress things go from bad to worse when sewage from the
Upper Floor apartment leaks all over her clothes

forcing her to pay for the use of shatty less than attractive
wardrobe in time to get to an audition to turn her life

around unbeknown to her a grand lottery ticket is still in one of
the pockets

and as she leaves the disastrous audition it goes off and she is
holding the winning prize and immediately is

identified as the winner of the $3.6 billion pot all the other
hopefuls in

the casting office start to attack her leading to another Showdown
with a group of black belts nearby she then

relentlessly is pursued through the city even watched by overhead
drones among

those out to kill her is shatty who rightly feels it was her ticket
and even the nice old woman Becky Anne Baker

Katie met on the bus is on her tail you get the impression everyone
in La is a

greedy potential Hitman in search of the person whose luck isn’t so
lucky coming

to the rescue is a well-meaning protector NL John Cena who offers to
help her survive in return for a cut of

her winnings they get into all sorts of peril Katie conveniently has
no end of

martial arts skills before nl’s very slick competition Lou Lewis
simu

noticing she has some ACE survival instincts comes in for a piece of
the action with his large staff and much

more professional Lottery protection company Katie won’t buy into it
until he also promises NL a generous portion as

well turns out Lewis really is just out for himself and has no
intention of

letting Katie live so all bets are off as hell on Earth truly breaks
out for

Katie and null disappointingly Paul the comedy Maestro of the likes
of

Bridesmaids spy the eat a simple favor and the all female
Ghostbusters directs

this zaniness but fails to Rin it in for at least the first 40
minutes or so

which plays like a roadrunner cartoon one near Miss after another it
is exhausting before the non-stop action

stops to take a breath and we get any semblance of character
development by then it really is too late there is an

occasional moment or two that might qualify as clever notably a set
piece inside a Hollywood bull Boulevard wax

museum where the combatants use the celebrity figures As Weapons
including Kim Kardashian’s head but it doesn’t get

much better than that folks Aquafina takes on the jackiechan style
role and

is talented enough to at least try to give her some Dimension Cena
continuing

his new career turn as Amazon’s comedy star after the much funnier
Ricky stanicki is as appealing as the

circumstances allow Liu is ideally cast as the villain and does what
he can with

the material small praise indeed unfortunately for much of the rest
of the cast particularly Mary they are all

made out to be maniacal human beings with one thing on their mind
kill the grand lottery winner at all costs even

Machine Gun Kelly AKA Coulson Baker turns up to no avail the stunt
performers are the real stars here so

give them an a for effort at least James Young gets a key credit as
action

choreographer I get that jackpot in addition to its wacky premise
also is

trying to be a new age it’s a mad mad mad mad world but that
60-year-old

classic used its treasure hunt premise as a real comment on the
human thirst for greed and also never forgot how to

mine for Laughs in the process jackpot is a 2024 American action
comedy film

directed by Paul and written by Rob yum the film stars Aquafina John
Cena

hien myy Donald Elise Watkins Sam asgari and simu Leu the film
follows Katie

Aquafina a former child actor who wins a $3.6 billion Lottery and
must fend off

people trying to kill her in a future version of California Amazon
Studios began developing the film under the

title Grand death lotto in March 2023 Aquafina Cena and the rest of
the

cast was announced and filming began the same month jackpot was
released by

Amazon MGM Studios through Prime video on August 15th 2024 the film
received generally mixed

reviews from critics movie plot by 2030 the financially desperate
government of

California creates the deadly Grand Lottery each Lottery day the
randomly selected winner must survive until

sundown anyone with a losing ticket can kill the winner to claim the
multi-million dollar prize instead but

no one may use guns former child actor Katie Kim arrives in Los
Angeles with

hopes of re-entering Show Business unaware of the lottery and its
record $3.6 billion jackpot renting a room from

money hungry shatty and her boyfriend dj Katie attends a
disappointing audition

and inadvertently enters and wins the lottery attacked on site by
everyone around her she is soon found by NL

Cassidy a freelance Lottery protection agent who offers his services
in exchange for 10% of her winnings

fighting off dozens of Katie’s murderous fans using non-lethal means
NL and Katie

Escape in his car and he explains that a drone tracking Katie will
post her location every 14 minutes but she can

officially quit The Lottery by reaching the grape vine on the
outskirts of the city unwilling to trust null Katie

realizes that even the police want to kill her and flees on foot a
sympathetic

security guard lets her hide inside a wax museum but a phone call
from shatty leads her and DJ to Katie’s location she

escapes and is rescued by null pursued by shatty DJ and a
sightseeing Bus full

of tourists they drive to MGK’s mansion and commandeer his Panic
Room shooting

him with tranquilizer darts and NL assures Katie of his commitment
to helping her shatty coerces MGK to give

up the Panic room’s passcode forcing null to call in a favor with
the Lewis Protection Agency before the mob can

break in the LPA short circuits their phones and drives Katie and NL
to safety

at alpa’s high-tech facility Katie meets Lou Lewis the head of the
agency who

agrees to protect her in exchange for the LPA and null each
receiving 30% of

the prize money null reveals that he and Louie are the sole
survivors of a team

of mercenaries and NL uses his protection earnings to support the
families of their fallen comrades Katie

is given an elaborate prosthetic disguise and prepares to be driven
to safety but NL suspects that the LPA has

been murdering their clients keeping the winners Anonymous and
claiming their winnings he allows the crowd of fans

into the facility allowing Katie to drive away alone and is captured
by Louie before Katie can reach the grap

Vine Louie calls threatening to kill NL unless she surrenders Lou
brings NL to

an abandoned theater admitting that he killed their fellow
mercenaries to keep a stash of gold for himself Katie

arrives and forces Louie to spare NL by threatening to kill herself
and forfeit the jackpot live streaming on her phone

as proof the live stream summons Katie’s fans and she and NL fight
off the mob

and the LPA cornered by Louie high above the stage Katie manages to
kill him with

his own grenades but falls from the scaffolding how however she is
caught by

a crowd of genuine fans who have arrived to help just as the lottery
deadline Runs Out She and N celebrate her Victory

6 months later Katie and NL have used her prize money to open a
variety of

businesses and nonprofits including their own protection agency that
guards lottery winners for free mid credit

scenes reveal that they have bought a super yacht acknowledging that
money has changed them while MGK orders an

improved Panic Room and more darts and the grand Lottery prepares to
expand across the country cast Aquafina as

Katie John Cena as null Biden Mary as shatty Donald Elise Watkins as
DJ Donald

Sam asgari as senior agent Ash Coulson Baker as himself simu Leu as
Louis Lewis

seen William Scott as rugged Man Maran green as lunch lady Rosanna
scato as

news anchor Dolly Delon as Grand matala Murray Hill as Johnny Grand
Becky Anne

Baker as sweet Irene Adam Ray as dad Monique ganderton as aent hoit
Bobby

Lee as himself production in March 2023 it was announced that an
action comedy

film titled Grand death Lotto was in development at Amazon Studios
Paul fig

had been hired to direct written by Rob yescome and produced by Joe
Roth Jeff

kersin bam fig and Laura Fischer John Cena Zack Roth and yum served
as

executive producers Cena Aquafina and simu were cast in the main
roles Iden

Mary seen William Scott Dolly dilon and Donald Elise Watkins joined
the cast

later in the month principal photography began in March 2023 at
Shadowbox studios

in Atlanta Georgia release jackpot was released by Amazon

MGM Studios through Prime video on August 15th 2024 reception on the
review aggregator

website Rotten Tomatoes 32% of 50 critics reviews are positive with
an

average rating of 4 6/10 Metacritic which uses a weighted average
assigned

the film a score of 42 out of 100 based on 18 critics indicating
mixed or

average reviews jackpot movie review jackpot is a trashy and
repetitive

action comedy about greed and bloodlust set in a world full of
people who are proud to be awful directed by Paul

spy it’s set in near future Los Angeles which begins to seem like a
statement in

itself as the movie goes along there’s a Statewide lottery for some
reason the

state government has decreed that citizens are permitted to hunt and
kill winners to try and take their prize

money a handful of rules govern the hunt one is only those who’ve
purchased a

ticket and lost the draw can take part another rule is no guns
allowed a third

is the hunt can only go on for 24 hours if the original winner has
survived at

the end of that period they get to keep their winnings other than
that anything

goes participants can use knives clubs broken bottles bats chains
rubber hoses

Spears curtain rods mop handles and presumably automobiles though I
don’t

recall anyone trying to run anyone down deliberately which seems
like a strange Omission in retrospect they can hunt

alone or in groups even very large groups Aquafina plays the target
of the

latest hunt Katie Kim a former actress who just returned home from
many years

spent visiting her dying mother in another state her dad died a
while the four she didn’t have a good relationship

with either parent we get a bit of detail about her personal life to
explain why she doesn’t know anything

about the California State Lottery turning into a murderous Manhunt
she’s been spending time with her mom no

really that’s the reason and also why she’s worthy of our sympathy
beyond the fact that like other past lottery

winners she doesn’t deserve to be hunted like an animal nobody does
Katie comes

into her own winning ticket purely by accid accient and doesn’t
realize she has it until her number comes up during

an audition which she doesn’t get and everybody starts looking at
her like a cartoon wolf staring at a lamb and

imagining lamb chops an entire economy seems to have grown up around
the lottery hunt though the movie only zeros

in on one part the Security Experts who locate winners and offer
them protection

from harm in exchange for a cut of their Fortune John Cena plays one
such

security guard a lovable Bruiser named NL he used to work for a very
successful

Lottery security company run by a snotty badass named Lou Lewis simu
he saves

Katie from Death after the audition when everyone in the building
including other actresses and a gymnasium full of karate

students have turned on her she studied stage fighting but didn’t
learn a lot

her instincts are good but she lacks the moves to survive without n
she’d be dead

meat and without Katie null would be just another Square jwy man
he’s got a

backstory of course which Katie will gradually pry out of him
written by Rob

yome whose prior work was mainly on video games jackpot doesn’t make
a lick

of real world sense and it’s not supposed to it has a video game
like repetitiousness and gradual escalation

leading to a big boss Showdown there’s a lot of obviously improvised
comedy that

sometimes lands but more often feels like somebody filmed the
exercises in a comedy performance Workshop it’s all in

service of a movie that’s more half-baked goof than fullblown satire
and it seems committed to not

investigating the deeper implications of the scenario it’s
presenting in which the lottery Hunt is The Logical

outgrowth of a society that seems to have completely given up on
modeling decent values and has decided instead to

monetize the worst human behavior when Katie rents a tiny room from
a website

and realizes when she gets there that it doesn’t look anything like
the pictures online the young woman who rents it

appropriately named shatty Iden myy chirps we used fake photos
because who’s

going to stay here if we don’t early in the movie Katie sees a
hateful stage dad

loudly and profanely griping about his young daughter who just
failed an audition sorry for all the bad words he

tells the kid I only curse when your mom’s being a fgbh base
character actress Becky Anne

Baker gives us a glimpse of what the movie could have become in her
brief performance as a lady who seems gentle

and kind but is anything but she captures the professional
predator’s self-satisfied inward smirk at fooling

somebody who trusts them a marrow deep rottenness that is expressed
through fleeting glimmers in the eyes and that

is visible only to people who know what to look for but with a few
exceptions

the movie’s way shallower than its best character moments we don’t
know what the state gets out of letting people hunt

lottery winners as in The Purge series it seems on its face as if
the cleanup

required the next day would outweigh whatever value the exercise has
in collectively permitting a society to let

off some steam but this is frankly not the kind of movie where you
are supposed to think anything except that was a

pretty funny line or that looks like that must have hurt or cool
stunt there

are seeds here that could have flowered in into an audacious action
comedy perhaps in the vein of Robocop or the

Running Man or Battle Royale I kept thinking of that last one
throughout

jackpot because unlike jackpot it’s so cynical that it has moved
Beyond

bitterness and into a kind of Blas matter of factless and also
because it has an actual Vision rather than a

notion and the action is imaginatively framed lit choreographed and
edited an

area of film making that has never been fig strength or honestly one
of his main areas of Interest though spy had its

Kick-Ass moments such as the kitchen fight the two stars have good
chemistry

they seem to genuinely enjoy being around each other but there’s
nothing in the script that challenges either of

them in the way that James gun challenged Cena in two genuinely
special superhero projects The Suicide Squad and

Peacemaker or that Lulu Wang challenged Aquafina in the farewell for
the most

part this is a lacad isical project that is an example of the coar
ins sensibilities

it’s making fun of as is often the case with improv driven movies
the outtakes

that play during the end credits are more natural and pleasurable
than the movie jackpot is a 2024 American action

comedy directed by Paul and penned by Rob yescome a film that boasts
an

intriguing premise but unfortunately falls short of its potential
set in the

not so distant future with a state ravished by the idiotic socialist
policies of its leadership High

inflation poor living conditions sound familiar the story imagines a
world

where winning the lottery isn’t just about instant wealth but about
surviving the day as well it’s a novel idea ripe

for both tension and laughs yet the film struggles to fully deliver
on either

front The Narrative centers around Katie Kim a struggling actress
played by the

ever charismatic Aquafina who unexpectedly wins the grand lottery in
California the twist California’s new

law states that anyone holding a losing ticket can legally murder
the winner before Sundown and claim the jackpot

it’s a deliciously dark concept that sets the stage for a wild ride
across Los Angeles think a light-hearted

version of The Purge with Katie forced to team up with NL Cassidy an
amateur Lottery protection agent played by John

Cena together they must Dodge A Mir ad of quirky dangerous and
outright bizarre

assassins all eager to cash in on Katie’s billion dooll prize
Aquafina

shines in the role of Katie bringing her trademark wit and
relatability to a character who feels out of her depth but

determined to survive her chemistry with John Cena’s null is one of
the film’s

few consistent Delights Cena playing the tough but Goofy protector
is clearly in

his element and his physicality adds a layer of off authenticity to
the action sequences their partnership albeit

predictable is engaging and they make for an entertaining Duo as
they navigate the perilous streets of Los Angeles

special shout out to John Cena’s makeup and hair team they are doing
Miracles

with that thinning thatch simu Leu cast as nl’s slick rival Lou
Lewis provides a

compelling foil to Cena’s character however despite his undeniable
screen

presence Liu’s talents are somewhat underutilized with his role
feeling more like an obligatory antagonist rather

than a fully fleshed out character The Supporting Cast including
Iden Mary as

The Eccentric shatty Donald Elise Watkins as the DJ turned hacker
Donald

and Sam asgari as the non-nonsense senior agent Ash all add color to
the film but are often sidelined by the

Relentless pace of the plot Bobby Le’s Cameo as himself is a brief
but memorable moment in injecting a bit of

self-aware humor into the mix visually jackpot impresses with its
well

choreographed action scenes and creative set pieces Paul Fig’s
Direction ensures

that the film moves at a Brisk Pace with moments of genuine suspense
as Katie and NL evade their pursuers the

cinematography captures the sun soaked yet perilous streets of Los
Angeles and the futuristic touches B minimal are

enough to sell the near future setting without overwhel helming the
story however where jackpot stumbles is in its

comedic elements for a film marketed as an action comedy it
surprisingly lacks

the sharp humor one would expect from a fague directed project the
jokes often

fall flat and the attempts at satire feel half-hearted leaving the
audience yearning for the biting wit or clever

dialogue that could have elevated the film it’s clear that much of
the humor relies on improvisation particularly

from aqua and Cena but without a strong script to back them up even
their best

efforts can’t quite land the punch lines the film also suffers from
a sense of

predictability with the plot unfolding in a rather formulaic manner
it’s as if

the movie was crafted by an algorithm ticking off boxes for Action
tension and

comedy but missing the soul that makes such a story truly engaging
there’s an

underlying sense that jackpot could have been more a sharper script
a tighter

narrative and a stronger commitment to its comedic Roots might have
made it a standout in the genre was the script

literally written by AI after inputting a few prompts jackpot is a
film that

tantalizes with its concept But ultimately underwhelms in execution
Aquafina and John Cena do their best to

breathe life into their roles and there are moments of genuine
excitement but the film’s lackluster humor and by the

Numbers storytelling prevent it from from hitting the jackpot it so
clearly aspires to be with a score of 5 out of

10 jackpot is a missed opportunity delivering a moderately
entertaining

experience that Fades from memory as quickly as it plays out on
screen other

information about this film the ceiling’s pretty low on the action
comedy category a genre whose biggest

hits tend to Pepper anemic shootouts with Wise Cracks from former
Saturday Night Live stars with Prime video entry

jackpot director Paul switches up the formula crafting stunt
intensive set

pieces where the action itself makes you laugh that could mean
anything from Aquafina Hiding Out Among the wax

figures of a tacky Hollywood museum to the site of ex wrestler John
Cena taking on a room of black belts with the crazy

Rich Asians breakout strapped to his back why are people trying to
kill

Aquafina jackpot asks audiences to buy into a clever but often El
iCal premise

about a radical rule change to the California lottery in the year
2030 the

winning ticket comes with a price the money is only yours to keep if
you can stay alive till sundown in the meantime

winners must navigate an impromptu Hunger Games on the streets of
Los Angeles in which their winnings double

as a sort of bounty awarded to whoever’s crafty enough to kill them
no offense to

Rob yum who was named one of variety’s screenwriters to watch last
year but

that idea is about as far as he got in a sloppy screenplay that’s
otherwise propped up by whatever improv the cast

could bring and surprisingly funny fight scenes shows how the states
Win Lose

Or Die Lottery works right out of the gate as that day’s winner scen
William Scott tries to outrun a greedy mob the

rules seem pretty straightforward which makes it hard to swallow
that Aquafina doesn’t know what’s going on when her

number is drawn the comic plays it equal parts or Y and oblivious as
Katie Kim a

former child actor who’s not crazy about having to perform again but
has no other

choice after her deadbeat stage Dad ran off with all her earnings
during her

first amusingly humiliating audition she discovers the winning
ticket in her pocket accidentally activates it with

her thumb and the next thing she knows she’s become an instant
celebrity the most valuable person in all of La lucky

for her a freelance bodyguard named NL Cena bursts through the wall
like a muszle bound Koolaid man and starts

knocking heads he’s the near future equivalent of an ambulance
chasing lawyer and a welcome Ally in helping

Katie avoid her fans as the movie calls them turns out not everyone
wants to

kill her but like any good talent agent this guy expects a 10%
commission there

are traces running all through jackpot of a more pointed Hollywood
satire as if

yes or or someone along the way wanted to skewer Americans obsession
with becoming rich and famous weirdly

enough ktie doesn’t want either she didn’t buy the ticket but found
it in a borrowed pair of gold lame sweat pens

stranger still the movie seems to have landed on the word weird at
the same moment that VP candidate Tim Walls made

it the insult dour adding an unexpected resonance to some of the
movie’s weaker

Jabs jackpot demands a trickier kind of physical comedy than
aquafine has been

asked to deliver before and even though her character is supposed to
read as clumsy and incompetent it takes

considerable skill to pull off the routines that action
choreographer James Young has in store for her given his WWE

background Cena is far more accustomed to making fake fighting seem
entertaining but once again reminds of

his good sport sense of humor as the scene stealer did earlier this
year in Ricky stanik

13 years ago struck comedy gold with the Jud APO produced
bridesmaids but

he’s subsequently been hit and miss trying to Edge his way into
other genres most recently with your fantasy flop the

school for good and evil fitting neatly between the Heat and 2016’s
Ghostbusters

reboot jackpot finds the Dapper director squarely in his comfort
zone falling

back on some of the tricks that worked so well in Bridesmaids minus
the underlying relatability of that film’s

brilliant screenplay the most obvious of those strategies comes in
casting which

he entrusts the secret weapon Allison Jones who’s been unearthing
funny people for him and AP as far back as Freaks and

Geeks it was Jones who brought Seth Roan and Melissa McCarthy into
the mix here

she delivers half a dozen diverse laugh out loud supporting Comics
to The Ensemble from Katie’s insensitive

homicidal airan host Iden Mary to the Shady leader of the lottery
Protection Agency simu Leu who’s looking to steal

nl’s fee for himself she even enlists Machine Gun Kelly who proves a

self-deprecating good sport in playing a Panic Room ready version of
himself the

jackpot script is full of twists few of which will come as a
surprise so why

spoil them here meanwhile that puts the burden on how well Aquafina
and Company

can punch up their scenes Jack pot winds up being one of those
movies where you

can tell the actors tried dozens of jokes and the editor went with
the best ones although the outtake loaded and

credits suggest funnier options often existed in a way it’s fitting
that Katie’s survival depends on how well she

can think on her feet considering how heavily the film also relies
on improvisation it’s that very skill that

stands to make Aquafina a millionaire the convenience of watching a
tacky flick from the comfort of your couch

without the few dozen ads or overpriced popcorn often softens the
blow of subpar

Cinema but not even the most forgiving of streaming audiences could
stomach Amazon Prime’s latest attempt at an

action comedy jackpot which seems to have emerged fully formed from
the

smoldering wreckage of a thousand better ideas the latest addition
to the digital

wastland of forgettable streaming content jackpot attempts to revive
the action comedy genre with its uninspired

slapstick dystopia directed by Paul who guaranteed a certain level
of

comedic Ingenuity in his earlier work this fresh Venture is a shoddy
Affair from start to finish seemingly cobbled

together from the detritus of The Purge and Squid game unfortunately
even bridesmaid’s Nostalgia isn’t quite

enough to salvage this pedestrian mess there’s a tragic irony about
jackpot

being a film about the Perils of easy money when it feels like the
script was written on the Fly ostensibly for the

same motive the premise while not groundbreaking certainly held the
potential for some trashy fun the film

is set in a dystopian Los Angeles where the economy has gone the way
of the dodo and the only hope for the downtrod in

masses is the grand Lottery a multi-million dollar jackpot that
comes with a rather macabra catch the winner

must survive until sundown while the rest of the city is given cart
blanch to hunt them down if the winner makes it

through the day they get the jackpot if not the person who kills
them takes home

the prize enter Katie Aquafina a washed up child star returning to
Hollywood

after caring for her sick mother a series of increasingly improbable
mishaps lands her a winning lottery

ticket and suddenly she’s the target of every money hungry resident
in the city

her only hope NL John Cena a musclebound protection agent who offers
his services

in exchange for a cut of the winnings the pair bumbles their way
through a series of increasingly absurd scenarios

from fending off crazed yoga instructors to navigating the waxy
Labyrinth of Madame tcads and perhaps most menacing

of all the script’s Relentless barrage of unfunny jokes aquaus Katie
is an odd

mix of naivity and smarts a character designed to be endearing in
her helplessness But ultimately annoying in

her lack of Common Sense watching her stumble from one perilous
situation to another rarely without some

ill- advised quip or pop culture reference made watching her journey
all the more frustrating Aquafina has more

than proven her comedic chops but here her talents are abysmally
squandered on a character that lacks any real agency

or depth halfway through the chaos you find yourself not rooting for
her survival but rather hoping she’ll find a

quieter corner to hide in where we can all be spared her inaine
banter Cena

fares slightly better but even his natural Charisma and knack for
physical comedy can’t Elevate jackpot above its

middling screenplay Cena’s null could have been a real Delight but
the writing consistently lets him down the jokes

rarely land and moments of genuine tension are undercut by poorly
timed gags and an over Alliance on Cena’s

imposing physicality in a more competently made film his role could
have been a saving Grace while here it’s

nothing but yet another missed opportunity The Supporting Cast
including simu Leu as a shady corporate

security CEO does little to improve matters however hard he tries
Liu’s

character is a one-dimensional villain and then of course there’s
Machine Gun Kelly whose inexplicable Cameo only

serves to produce some disturbing rectal imagery and to remind us
how b-grade the

production really is the less said about that the better perhaps the
film’s most glaring flaw is

how Fig’s Direction swings erratically between chaotic action
sequences and poorly timed forced humor creating a

disjointed viewing experience the action is frantically edited to
the point of incoherence with fight scenes that feel

more like a flurry of Limbs making it hard to follow who’s fighting
who or what’s at stake meanwhile the film’s

attempts at satire are clumsy and superficial leaving us with
nothing more more than a collection of shallow Jabs

at consumer culture by the time the credits roll accompanied by the
obligatory blooper reel which turned out

to be significantly more entertaining jackpot ends up as yet another
forgettable streaming entry destined to

be lost in the algorithmic shuffle if you’re looking for a Mindless
way to kill a couple of hours there are far

worse ways to spend your time but only just more details in the
Prime video

film jackpot the state of California implements a new kind of
Lottery where the winner makes a life-changing amount

of cash but only if they can stay alive within the borders of Los
Angeles until

sundown The Twist is that every other ticket holder can still claim
the jackpot for themselves if they can

manage to kill the winner within that time frame turning each Lotto
drawing into a crazed Citywide Manhunt set in

the 2030s when the US economy is worse than ever and homeless camps
lit the

streets jackpot has a log line that sounds like it should come from
a new Purge sequel or maybe a lowbudget

thriller that finally draws John Carpenter out of retirement instead
it

arrives as a loud crass and deeply unfunny comedy curtesy of
Bridesmaids

and Ghostbusters 2016 director Paul it’s tough to recall another
recent

example where a filmmaker and his material are so disastrously
mismatched and the end result is catastrophic for

everyone involved in Jackpot Aquafina plays Katie Kim a former child
actor who

returns to California to have another go at a Hollywood career after
her ailing mother who she had been caring for back

in Michigan passes away in the first of the film’s many senseless
contrivances

Katie isn’t even aware that the state has a new kind of Lottery that
activates the blood lust of nearly all of Los

Angeles so she’s completely befuddled when she accidentally
activates a ticket

she finds in a borrowed piece of clothing is declared the winner and
suddenly finds herself being attacked by

almost every person she comes in contact with all assaults are up
close and personal as guns are banned by the

Lottery’s rules one of the few people not trying to kill her is John
Cena’s null a protection agent who will work to

keep her alive until sundown for a standard 10% of her winnings a
very

confused Katie is reluctant to accept his offer at first but event
comes to rely on null especially once a bigger

shadier and much more corporate protection agency led by an old
military

buddy of nolles played by simul Leu is drawn into their mad Scramble
for riches

based on that summation you might assume that jackpot turns into a
bloody gorist

but you’d be wrong the movie states its intentions in the first few
moments when the on-screen text that establishes the

film’s Universe and rules ends with some people call it dystopian
but those

people are no fun working from a script by Rob yescom severely
downplays the

violent implications of the story to instead tell a light Hollywood
satire stuffed with jokes that range from

terrible there’s a character who’s a DJ named DJ to a life force
draining level

of dreadful at one point Machine Gun Kelly seemingly just playing
his current

day self even though the movie is set at least 6 years into the
future mistakenly thinks Cena wants to have sex

with him and says you would turn my into the eye of saon so let’s

not go on that Fellowship of my ring an end of Movie blooper real
reveals that

other equally bad options were considered for that retort while also
proving that you can’t get away from

jackpot as juvenile sex jokes even once you’ve suffered through to
the credits

additionally there are fart jokes shart jokes the insinuation that
two supporting characters had sex with a wax

Recreation of the wizard of Oz’s tinman and a lame recurring bit
about how Cena’s character is unreasonably

obsessed with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles if this is what
counts for fun

I’ll happily trade it back in for a standard issue gloomy dystopia
please

almost every aspect of jackpot feels like a misfire either for tonal
or

story- based reasons why a lottery that includes the attempted
murder of the winner proves to be a bigger Money Maker

than the regular Lottery is never addressed and while I don’t
disagree that culture has stagnated it’s weird to

see a movie supposedly set in a more hellish near future continually
dropping lazy pop culture references in addition

to the TMNT thing and Machine Gun Kelly being around there are shout
outs to Star Wars The Karate Kid the Kardashians

and more it’s genuinely mystifying even worse it’s annoying early on
in the

movie Katie is forced to deal with a ditsy airin be renter named
shatty Iden Mary who quickly makes a strong case for

being the most irritating and unwelcome character in a film this
year Cena and

Leu the latter of whom must be desperately waiting for Marvel to get
him back on the schedule end up in a

screaming match about lacas sparkling water at one point things
aren’t much

better on the action side of this action comedy again it’s a story
choice to have

the film’s events play out as silly instead of violent because the
Lottery Commission has drones that follow Katie

around and Report her location at regular intervals she and NL are
constantly under attack by young punks

wannabe actors no so kindly grandmas and anyone else who’s within
grabbing

distance of a knife or Hatchet however Katie and NL two people the
movie

continually insists are among the few good people left in a world
gone mad refus to respond in kind typically

disarming and incapacitating their foes as pleasantly as possible at
one point

Cena puts a helmet on an attacker before tossing them out of their
moving vehicle because he doesn’t want them to sustain

a head injury Katie is surprisingly effective at fending off hordes
of greedy Maniacs although the movie’s

explanation that it’s because she once took a stunt fighting class
feels like everything else exceedingly flimsy the

fights themselves are slap sticky the kind of throw Downs you’d see
in in a jackiechan film but without someone as

skilled as Chan gracefully centering the action and holding the
frame the film’s

ideas about the struggle to remain a good person when times are bad
and how the government will play us all against

each other for its own gain are so simple basic and non-committal
that no real thematic through line is ever able

to emerge as a result jackpot could be looked at as an allegory for
fame and

instant stardom all the people trying to kill to claim the jackpot
are labeled as

her fans and Katie’s face is suddenly on every screen in the city
but that feels

inconsequential and unprobed as well probably because the filmmakers
were more concerned about fitting in another

couple of butthole jokes all of this is to say Aquafina and Cena
have both done

far better work elsewhere there are exactly two jokes here that got
me to faintly smile the first is when Aquafina

tells Cena he looks like a bulldog dog that a witch cast a spell on
and turned into a human against his will pretty

accurate that and then near the end of the movie Aquafina makes a
crack about

acting being a worthless Endeavor as wrestlers and YouTubers are
movie stars now it’s an easy joke about

her and Cena’s more humble Origins and it’s likely less clever than
the best joke from any randomly selected Deadpool

scene but considering the laugh free 90 plus minutes that preceded
did it this

moderately amusing self-referential crack felt like discovering an
oasis after spending ages lost in the desert

the movie might be called jackpot but no one is leaving this one a
winner an

homage to the great International action comedy star from
screenwriter rob yescome a video game riter designer now

turning to the big screen this over-the-top frenetic stew not only
lacks Chan to make it hum it also lacks

any sense of credibility in order to to keep us engaged with its
absurd premise

set in a decaying Los Angeles Atlanta subs for it in 2026 2 years
from now

when the filmmakers Apparently think America has gone to hell we are
introduced right from the start to the

Grand Lottery a contest that promises Untold riches to whoever can
survive

actually winning it and avoid being killed by the Rabid citizenry
but if they succeed in knocking you off within

24 hours they will get the money promised by your ticket think of it
as sort of a comedic Purge thus rugged Man

seen William Scott is in a battle for his life that ends when a
kindly older woman Dolly Deon succeeds in offing him