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Lucky

Posted on May 9, 2018December 29, 2020 by Village Vidiot

  “Lucky,”  May 9, 2018 (2017), DVD, home.  This was a wonderful way for Harry Dean Stanton to go out as an actor, and he knew it. It was clearly a love letter to and also about him. Set in the desert somewhere, Stanton plays Lucky, a WWII Navy vet who served on LSTs at the Battle of Okinawa. Not surprisingly, so did Stanton. Lucky lives alone, follows a strict routine of exercise, smoking, drinking lots of milk, and going to a bar every night. And then he falls, and his fall is a wakeup call to his mortality. Entropy and time bring us all down. How does one with no family, few close connections, and no faith make sense of what’s happening?. How is the void not terrifying?. What does one do to make meaning of nothing, ungatz?. Big questions?. You bet and this John Carroll Lynch directed flick does not run away from them. People bring meaning in a meaningless world and Lucky accepts the Sisyphean struggle to confront his future with clear (if occasionally intoxicated) eyes and a wry smile. Lynch brings excellent character work from Stanton’s real life friend David Lynch, Ron Livingston, Tom Skerritt, and Ed Begley, Jr The film highlights Stanton’s real-life love of Mariachi music (he had his own band that specialized in it) and he lets Stanton’s face and life story shine. Camus would be proud. This one is a real winner. Be sure to listen to the whole song that plays during the credits at the end, it’s a paean to Harry Dean and a real joy

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