Lucky (2017)

[StevePulaski]

Lucky (2017)
Directed by: John Carroll Lynch

Harry Dean Stanton is Lucky in one of his final film roles.

Rating: ★★★½

If Hank Williams managed to grow old, he probably would've looked a lot like Harry Dean Stanton does in Lucky. Stanton's clothes hang limply off of his body, and his flannel shirt crossed with tight-jeans suggests a rancher in a small Texas town that has weathered many storms. The look in his worn, wrinkled face complete with thinning hair and bagged-eyes show a man who has had a lot of life-experience, and after years of doing onto life, he is finally letting life do onto him.

There's every reason to believe that by describing Lucky and his presence in the film, you'll be describing the actor who plays him, Harry Dean Stanton, one of the finest character-actors and vice-versa. John Carroll Lynch's directorial debut is a beautiful swan-song for the 91-year-old actor with more than two-hundred on-screen appearances dating back to 1956. It's a film that correspondingly sets up one career while both quaintly concluding another one. It also respects the graceful techniques of slowburn pacing, conversational dialog, and quietly impacting moments that will stay with you like exercepts from a great novel.

Lucky is an elderly man living in the Arizona desert, and over the course of 88 minutes, there's reason to believe that the only things populating this locale are cacti, sand, a convenient store, and a tavern amidst a few ramshackle homes. Presumably in his nineties, Lucky has defied doctor's orders and many of his deceased friends with a steady diet of coffee, Bloody Marys, and American Spirits over the last several decades. He begins his days by getting limber and heading over to his favorite diner and ends them at the tavern where the popular topics of game-shows and retold stories populate the air until it's nearing Lucky's bedtime. It's the day-to-day life you see in many retirement communities where ambition is hindered by sleepiness and an inability to operate for too long without some body-part hurting.

The film follows Lucky as he goes on with his daily routine, mostly focusing on the rhythms of his life and the thoughts he exchanges with people that are a part of his life. One of his closest friends appears to be Howard (director David Lynch), who is heartsick over the disappearance of his pet tortoise named President Roosevelt, which prompts a humorous misunderstanding at the bar. Lucky likes his friend Howard enough that he's willing to challenge Bobby (Ron Livingston), a life insurance salesman, to a fisticuffs brawl outside of the bar for trying to take Howard's money during the final years of his life. Surprisingly, that's the only moment of true pugnaciousness we see out of the codger. He is either playfully disobedient with the tavern manager (Beth Grant) or relatably sarcastic with his doctor (Ed Begley, Jr.).

Speaking of his doctor, whom he visits following a fall from a brief spell of lightheadedness, Lucky learns from the man that he has won the genetic lottery, so it seems, in the regard that his health hasn't caught up with his smoking habits. After their visit, the doctor hands him a small lollipop. "What am I supposed to do with this," Lucky asks, "stick it up my ass?" The doctor looks on before replying with great dead-pan: "why don't you just suck it?" Lucky obliges.

Lucky is filled with humble yet noteworthy moments like this which work to give it larger thematic significance. This aforementioned banter provides, even in a crude way, the two paths to which one could reasonably employ when dealing with old age. You could "stick it up your ass," so to speak, and try to take resistant action to it, or you could deal with the inevitable and respond to circumstance as it unfolds. Lucky prefers to "suck it."

Another defining statement comes when Lucky, like many people his age, is trying to do his crossword puzzle and stumbles upon an unusual seven-letter-word that provides for some mental perspective: realism. "Realism is a thing," he tells the patrons at the bar one evening, sharing the wisdom he found in his lofty dictionary. On another day, he adds to the idea when trying to explain to the firecracker owner of the establishment how truth can be subjective and meaningfully articulating the idea that no one will get out of this world alive. "Smile," so says Lucky, in response to the inevitable.

Lucky is also a grand experience in regard to its aesthetics. Cinematographer Tim Suhrstedt elegantly captures the natural beauty of the Arizona desert, with emphasis on color and clarity during transitory moments that show the titular character pacing across dirt-roads or downtown streets. Complimenting these wide-angled shots is a lovely soundtrack of harmonicas and mariachi music that lovingly captures the locale and mood. Eventually, these moments become as grand as the ones where Lucky is conversing with the townfolk he's grown to know, and for a first-time director, John Carroll Lynch (famous for his roles in Fargo and most recently The Founder) makes these moments stand out.

Lucky isn't thematically profound, but it's damn-well hilarious and nimble in its perspective on growing old and recognizing your days are indeed numbered. Most importantly, it's a beautiful legacy film for Harry Dean Stanton, who sadly died in September of this year. For an actor that always played the eccentric or weather-worn characters in so many films, the culmination of his presence and life lives up to the name of this feature, which so artfully compliments him as an actor.

Starring: Harry Dean Stanton, David Lynch, Beth Grant, Ron Livingston, Ed Begley, Jr., and Tom Skerritt. Directed by: John Carroll Lynch.