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Lucky Louie Review
Image Credit: Magic Bean Entertainment
Loading...Lucky Louie Review
Basil Hoffman– Wilbert Moser
Daniel Roebuck– Hitch
Stephane Zimbalist– Pastor Mimi
Madelyn Dundon– Alex
Duane Whitaker– Payton
Willard E. Pugh– Pete
Timothy E. Goodwin– Barney
Patrick Voss Davis– Lincoln
(check out the rest of the cast here)
Directed by Daniel Roebuck and Grace Roebuck
Screenplay by Daniel Roebuck and Grace Roebuck
Produced by A Channel of Peace, Magic Bean Entertainment, The Marlowe-Pugnetti Company, and Dewlin Productions
Rated PG for mild thematic elements, language, and brief violence
Runtime– 108 minutes
A Channel of Peace official Facebook page
Lucky Louie, written and directed by Daniel Roebuck and Grace Roebuck, is a wonderful, new family comedy starring Basil Hoffman as Wilbert Moser, a retired police officer in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania who can’t shake the one case he was never able to solve. Despite being retired for decades and participating in his community in multiple ways (he’s a referee for children’s basketball games, he helps make food at his local church, among other things) Moser just can’t let it go, or, at least his mind can’t. Moser finds himself often dreaming about the robbery, which is obviously unpleasant. When his Bible study group (Hitch, played by co-director Daniel Roebuck; Payton, played by Duane Whitaker; Pete, played by Willard E. Pugh; and Lincoln, played by Patrick Voss Davis) finds out that Moser is in some sort of low level constant distress they try to help him. Moser, after all, helped them when he arrested them back in the day and pointed them towards God and whatnot and changed their lives. But how the heck are they going to help him? What can they do for Moser? Hitch hits up the local church pastor Mimi (Stephanie Zimbalist) for advice.
While all of that is going on, Alex (Madelyn Dundon), a graduate student that has been assigned to research the unsolved robbery for her thesis project, comes to town and tries to pick Moser’s brain about the robbery. Moser, at first, isn’t too keen on interacting with Alex as he suddenly starts to believe that he wants to move on from the robbery. It’s been so long, the statute of limitations has long since passed, and the perpetrator (or perpetrators) are probably long gone or dead. Moser claims that he just wants to move on. However, Alex is persistent and perceptive, and her dogged effort makes Moser change his mind.
And so Moser and Alex team up with Hitch, Payton, Pete, and Lincoln, and they form a sort of investigate committee concerning the robbery (they also bring in Barney, played by Timothy E. Goodwin. Barney owns the local bakery/desert place/hangout where Moser holds his Bible study group). The group questions the people they know were either witnesses, like the former bank manager (this poor guy has become an eccentric of the highest order)and a criminal known as “Dewey” who was caught and is still in prison (this guy’s name is Roger and he is played by Dave Alspach). Moser takes Alex to the local cold case cops so she can look at the official file on the case (Moser is a sort of legend at the station and, despite not being a cop anymore, seems to have the run of the place). All of this effort allows Alex and the rest of the group to gain new perspective on the case but they still don’t know who did it. So the group comes up with a new scheme: why not recreate the robbery to see if they can figure out who did it?
Recreate a bank robbery? In the same bank where it happened?
Yes. Recreate a bank robbery, in the same bank where it happened back in 1972, with the full support of the community. Perhaps getting everyone involved will help the group figure out who did it.
Lucky Louie actually starts out with the bank robbery that troubles Moser some four decades later. The heist is committed by four guys who don’t know one another but are hired to do the job. They disguise themselves by wearing ski masks and black clothing and they have codenames based on the Donald Duck family of characters (Donald and his nephews, basically). They drive to the bank in one car and attempt to commit the robbery as a team. However, multiple things screw up the plan and the robbery doesn’t go as planned. The four robbers are not bumbling fools but they’re also not cold blooded psychos. They’re not really “professionals” but they’re also not novice criminals. You get the sense that with a little more planning the robbers probably would have been able to pull of the heist without issue. They didn’t do that, though. They did have a plan, but they had no capacity to improvise once the hooey hit the fan. This bank robbery sets the tone of Lucky Louie: it’s kind of charming. I mean, yeah, there’s a mystery to be solved and there’s a low level of menace permeating the story (there’s also some mental anguish on Moser’s part), but the reality is that what we’re watching isn’t all that serious. Lucky Louie and the events and characters that make up the movie are meant to be warm hearted and fun and funny. Lucky Louie wants you to have a nice time with the nice ensemble assembled. And, nine times out of ten, Lucky Louie delivers and delivers big.
There’s a warm goofiness that is the heart of Lucky Louie and that is mostly due to star and co-director Daniel Roebuck and his character’s Bible study group. Whitaker, Pugh, and Davis have such tremendous buddy chemistry that you would be willing to watch them have their Bible study just to see what sort of jokes and tangents they would go off on while discussing whatever Biblical lesson Moser wanted to focus on. Heck, you’d probably hang around just to watch them eat pie and drink coffee and talk about their work days (and Hitch, Pete, and Lincoln would no doubt rag on Payton’s inflated sense of celebrity as a professional magician of sorts). Roebuck understands how to create a pleasant atmosphere that’s chock full of genuine warmth and a sense of fun that’s also filled with his faith. But there’s no preaching going on here. There’s no attempted conversion going on here. No one is telling you you’re going to hell. Instead, Lucky Louie wants you to know that these people, in this world, are nice people who just want to hang out with you and have fun. If there’s a problem that needs to be solved they will band together and figure out how to solve it and help you. And there’s no way in hell you wouldn’t want to hang out of Roebuck’s Hitch and his friends. You would want to participate in their Bible study group even if you think the Bible is a bunch of nonsense.
Lucky Louie takes its time, which is both a good thing and a bad thing. It’s a good thing because, again, you end up loving just about every character in the movie. You want to spend time with Hitch and his friends and Moser and Alex and Barney and the rest of the town. You might even want to live with them in that town one day. The movie’s deliberate pacing becomes an issue, though, when it comes time to solve the big mystery concerning the bank robbery. Once it’s obvious that Moser and the group have figured it out you want them to get to the point and get to it quickly. Because, really, who the heck committed the robbery? Why has the whole affair remained a mystery for so long? The movie doesn’t make an effort to get to the point, though. The movie continues on at the same steady pace that it started with.
Now, is the way the movie wraps itself up satisfying? Are you going to buy the big reveal? You might not, at least at first. The way the movie wraps itself up may seem a little too neat for its own good. And you might ask yourself at the end “Is that it? Is that really all there was to it?” You may feel a little deflated. But once you think about what is really going on with the big robbery and how it effects everyone in its wake you become okay with it. What ends up happening makes sense, both in terms of the story and the message that the Roebucks want to put out into the world. I’m not going to tell you who did what and how it all ends and wraps itself up, but I just want you to give it a chance. It does make sense.
Basil Hoffman, in his final role, is superb as Wilbert Moser. Hoffman plays Moser as a guy who, on some level, has had to figure out how to make the world a better place despite everything that he’s seen and had to do as a police officer. You can imagine that someone who spent countless hours of his life dealing with various crimes could very well end up bitter and mean and anti-social. Moser isn’t that way, though. Moser has used his Christian faith and its calling to make a positive difference in people’s lives. It’s why he’s so engaged in his community on every level, and it’s why he keeps leading that Bible study with the men he arrested. You can tell that Moser is thoughtful and deliberate while also being kind. Moser is practically a role model for people to follow. Hoffman just fills up the screen every time we see him and you pay attention to what he has to say. A streamlined reveal of the big mystery definitely would have helped Hoffman’s performance be even better than it is (he has some massive amounts of dialogue to dole out) but, like everyone else in the movie, you like spending time with him, even if things could have proceeded faster.
Daniel Roebuck, Duane Whitaker, Willard E. Pugh, and Patrick Voss Davis are, again, a tremendous foursome as Hitch, Payton, Pete, and Lincoln. The way they arrive at Barney’s bakery, clutching backpacks like they’re carrying around precious diamonds or a million dollars apiece only to reveal that they have their Bibles in their bags is hilarious. And it’s like this for the rest of the movie: they’re great friends, they love spending time with one another, and you, the audience, love watching them and being around them.
Stephane Zimbalist does a good job as Pastor Mimi. She’s available to provide perspective for the various characters looking for her advice while also carrying on some sort of relationship/friendship with Hitch. And Timothy E. Goodwin is fantastic as Barney the bakery owner. He’s probably the biggest goofball in the movie, but when you first meet him you think he’s just going to be some sort of background character (just a guy that hands out food to people that show up at his bakery). He isn’t. Watch him when he participates in the robbery re-enactment. It’s a brilliant performance.
And Madelyn Dundon is fantastic as Alex the graduate student. She’s smart and funny and determined to figure out what really happened with the bank robbery. You want her to succeed and help Moser deal with his guilt issues regarding not being able to figure out who did the robbery. Lucky Louie is Dundon’s second movie (she starred in Daniel Roebuck’s previous directorial effort Getting Grace) and it’s obvious that she has star power and, for the lack of a better word, “it.” I’m amazed that Dundon didn’t appear in a hundred movies after her performance in Getting Grace, and I will be further amazed if she doesn’t become a big deal movie star of some sort after Lucky Louie is unleashed upon the world. She really is that good.
Lucky Louie is a great family movie. Fun, funny, and filled with infectious warmth and a goofiness that only someone like Daniel Roebuck can deliver, Lucky Louie is the kind of movie that will make you laugh, make you smile, and make you have some faith in humanity. That’s very much a worthwhile thing.
See Lucky Louie. See it, see it, see it. Check out the A Channel of Peace Facebook page for updates on its release schedule (I believe it’s in the midst of playing at movie theaters across the country. A digital release of some sort will no doubt follow).
So what do we have here?
Dead bodies: None.
Explosions: None.
Nudity?: None.
Doobage: A car driving down an alley, men in ski masks, a hand grenade, a nifty jazzy opening theme, bank guard punching, a burglar alarm, smoke grenade hooey, multiple men holding backpacks close to their chests for some reason, ball busting, serious community engagement, pie eating, Bible study hooey, multiple nightmares, research, dream talk, multiple get-togethers among friends, prison, explanation of a “triple rat hole,” talk about cherries, multiple unexpected dates, old bank camera footage, a heart episode, attempted cat apprehension, multiple diplomas on the wall, a secret basement, a moral conundrum, a community led bank robbery re-enactment, talk of ruining a new pair of shoes, a lack of reflection, a long explanation of what really happened, and an ending that doesn’t seem to make sense but it really does when you think about it.
Kim Richards? There would have been if that guy didn’t stop his car.
Gratuitous: Bank robbers, Donald Duck codenames, praying, nuns, Daniel Roebuck, group Bible study, coffee and ball busting, multiple card tricks, a bowl of hot oatmeal, ketchup on oatmeal (who does that?), pie, Stephanie Zimbalist, church sanctuary, Bible stuff, Madelyn Dundon, a cat, a car wash, serious community engagement, Barney’s Café, ice cream and a lack of rainbow sprinkles, talk of The Wonderful World of Disney, the Hotel Bethlehem, a police detective that keeps his suit jacket in a filing cabinet, a barbecue get together, “by the grace of God,” Daniel Roebuck whispering the definition of FUBAR, Daniel Roebuck explaining what a “triple rat hole” is, a flash drive, a guy that keeps a flash drive in his sock, cat allergies, a cat carrier, Daniel Roebuck sleeping with a cat in his bed, “Where’s the Money?” T-shirts, a community prayer asking God to bless a bank robbery, talk of the Farmer’s Almanac, and an ending that doesn’t seem to make sense but it really does when you think about it.
Best lines: “This is a robbery!,” “Hey, it’s going to be okay. We’re going to be out of here in less than three minutes,” “Why’d you stop? I’m not a murderer! No, you’re a moron!,” “Payton, it was so real this time,” “Oh, well, I’d love to hear you talk about your bank robbery nightmare… again… but I’ve got something burning in the kitchen,” “Tell your Mom to call me,” “Willy definitely has a gift,” “Did you say shoofly pie?,” “How do you know Mr. Moser? We’re criminals,” “I’ve heard that God’s timing is always perfect,” “I like otters,” “Oh, boy, here’s trouble,” “Hello, desert has arrived,” “Do you smell vanilla?,” “I recently performed this trick for the Queen of England. At least she said she was the Queen of England,” “My worlds are colliding. And I love it,” “What is FUBAR?,” “Look at me, do I look like an honorable citizen to you?,” “I don’t know nothing about those cherries!,” “Mr. Tiller, we’re not here to talk about the cherries,” “I really wish you’d let me go Dutch,” “Hitch, what do you want to do? I want to rob a bank,” “Dude, we’re gonna be late! Hey! I told you guys I would help you rob the bank. I will not get a traffic ticket,” “Alex, this is sensational,” “I’m just here for the cherry pie,” “This was the greatest illusion of all,” “This case is officially closed,” “Am I the only whose mind is blown here?,” and “I stand before you a sinner and I ask for your forgiveness.”
