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Fair or not, streaming movies often have an air of lower expectations and a lower threshold for what’s deemed to be a good or bad movie. Sometimes known as “the Netflix bump,” a movie that would likely otherwise be negatively reviewed gets a softer review because you were able to watch it from the comfort of your home, didn’t have to drive to a theater, or pay for tickets and snacks, making the overall experience better, even if the movie itself wasn’t so great. But even with those caveats,Jackpot!, Amazon’s latest Prime Video release, still doesn’t come close to measuring up in any sense of the phrase.
Jackpot!Plot
Jackpot!takes place in a near-future Los Angeles, 2030. The New Government has created a Grand Lottery. It works much like the Powerball or any other lottery game, but with oneveryimportant catch: if someone manages to kill the winner (no guns, no bullets; otherwise, no rules), that person legally claims the jackpot prize. On the heels of the Great Depression of 2026, the general public is beyond desperate for money. So when the newest winner is announced, the knives come out, literally.
Katie Kim (Awkwafina) moves to Los Angeles, trying to break back into acting after a successful stint as a child actor. When she mistakenly finds herself with the winning ticket, she’s faced with a literal fight for her life. To survive the entire city coming after her, she teams up with Noel Cassidy (John Cena), a lottery protection agent who protects lottery winners for a piece of the jackpot winnings.
Jackpot!Review
Jackpot!is at least an original idea (though, yes, you may draw comparisons to thePurgeseries if you really want to), so it has that going for it. It’s an absurd premise that doesn’t require you to ask too many questions – not that there would be answers to be found anyway, but that’s beside the point. It starts off giving the audience some very basic background and context into the current landscape, and then jumps right in. No fluff, no unnecessary extended introduction to explain everything. So that’s good, a decent start at least. Unfortunately, it’s all downhill from there.
The setup for the plot means absolutely nothing to the story. The reason Katie was being hunted down could have been anything else at all, and it wouldn’t have changed a thing. Granted, with a direct-to-streaming action-comedy, nobody is expecting a grand treatise about capitalism or the economy or, well, anything at all. But to frame this story around some sort of economic disaster and the resulting fallout, and then to have none of that have even an ounce of consequence to the rest of the story leaves it all lacking.
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Even if director Paul Feig and and screenwriter Rob Yescombe had attempted to include some sort of real messaging to the story,Jackpot!’ssuccess – or lack thereof – was always going to hinge on two things: the comedy and the action. And? Big 0-2 there.
John Cena has parlayed hisprolific wrestling careerinto a successful acting career. He may not have the range of some of our better actors, but he has more than proven himself as an excellent comedic actor. A role like this is right in his wheelhouse, setting up what should have been an easy home run. But he’s completely failed by the script. The jokes he’s given land, outside of a couple chuckle-worthy gags. Cena’s giving it his all, so there’s no fault to be laid at his feet.
The action doesn’t fare any better. It’s not that it’s necessarily bad, but there’s no creativity behind it. There’s not one single moment that sticks out or that even approaches being memorable. Once again, Cena gives it his all, but the man can only do so much. His performance is at least passable, especially given the dreck he was given to work with.
Then there’s Awkwafina, co-lead and main character. This is a brutal performance. Shecan be good, and has been funny before in several projects. But she’s proven to be her funniest in supporting roles (Crazy Rich AsiansandShang-Chi,for example). Although, like Cena, the script does her no favors either. It has her spouting off one-liners every other time she speaks. And none are funny. The sheer volume of jokes only serves to emphasize how poor Awkwafina is in this movie.
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Even beyond the (lack of) comedy and bland action, both leads are simply uninteresting characters with no development. Expectations on the character development side of things are probably going to be lower for a movie like this, but you’ve got to give us something. Even Frank the Tank had more depth and development inOld Schoolthan both Katie and Noel have inJackpot!.It tries to squeeze in a little something for both. But it’s too short and lazily done. And besides, it was added in too late for anybody to even care about it.
Okay, let’s add a small piece of positivity here. Two supporting characters are able to stand out – relatively speaking: Ayden Mayeri as Katie’s Airbnb host and roommate Shadi and Donald Elise Watkins as Shadi’s boyfriend DJ Donald. The bumbling pair of idiots are responsible for the only true laughs in the movie. Even still, it only amounts to a couple of moments. But hey, at least it’s something?
IsJackpot!worth watching?
No.Jackpot!is an action-comedy with bland action and next to no laughs. It’s a failure on every level, and is not worth your time, even as a free streaming movie at home.
Jackpot!hits Amazon Prime Video on August 15.
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Matt Hambidge
Film Critic
Articles Published :119
Matt Hambidge is a film critic based in Minneapolis, and is a member of the Minnesota Film Critics Alliance.You can also find him covering SURVIVOR on the Talking Llama podcast.
