If you’ve ever visited a Crossword book store, you’d be familiar with the line, ‘Never judge a book by it’s movie.’ 21 however is an exception in this regard. This uber-slick adaptation of the novel Bringing Down The House, is by far one of the most brilliant movies I have seen in recent times. It captures your imagination right from the opening credits and there’s not a dull moment till the very last frame. The production values on this movie are top-notch. The players’ perspective camera shots have been rendered beautifully and maintain the breakneck speed of the movie.

I won’t give too much of the plot away. The story revolves around how 5 mathematically gifted students crack the Black Jack system with the help of their professor Mickey Rose (Kevin Spacey) and earn thousands of dollars each time at Las Vegas.

The star of the movie is young Jim Sturgess who plays the wide-eyed, geeky, boy genius Ben Campbell to perfection. Kevin Spacey too is at the top of his game as the shrewd professor who leads the ‘team’.

What makes this movie click in my opinion is the fact that it is realistically possible to employ the techniques used by the scammers in 21 unlike other other successful scam movies like Ocean’s Twelve and Catch Me If You Can.

The movie also features many a memorable dialogue like ‘Winner winner chicken dinner’ and ‘Dazzle Me!’ (which drew quite a lot of applause). This movie should be a serious contender at next year’s Oscars in my opinion. I would definitely love to watch this one again and would recommend it to each one of you. Go get dazzled today!

- JAM