Lucky for some
LINDSAY LOHAN plays Ashley Albright, a single girl in Manhattan, who has a couple of giggly girlfriends (Turner and Armstrong), a fast-track career in publicity, and is blessed with good fortune. Billionaires’ sons ask for her phone number, every lottery ticket is a winning one, even the rain stops for her and she never has a bad hair day.
Meanwhile, bowling-alley janitor, and industrious but hapless manager of a band called McFly, Jake Hardin (Pine) is her antithesis. He has lousy luck, anything that can go wrong will go wrong.
One evening, at a masquerade ball, Ashley and Jake kiss. When the two pull away, Jake becomes an overnight success as a boy-band promoter, while Ashley, who has come to expect the gods of good luck to smile upon her, is stunned when she breaks a heel and gets a run in her stocking.
In a matter of hours, Ashley loses her job, her apartment and most of her dignity. Not only is she without her good luck, but she seems to be cursed. Jake, on the other hand, is having everything go right for him for a change. When Ashley tries to get her luck back from Jake, she ends up falling in love in the process.
Just My Luck is about luck, and how it can change. It jabs at the vulnerable hearts and hopes of 13-year-old girls, and makes way for all manner of superstitions – breaking a mirror, a black cat, throwing spilled salt over the shoulder and other old wives tales.
In the role of Ashley, Lohan gets to be somewhat annoying. We’ve all met those people who seem to have everything go their way. They have no struggles in life, and they’re completely self-centred. That is the character of Ashley. Even when she loses her luck, she never really grows enough as a character for you to warm to her. Instead, Pine as the unlucky Jake Hardin steals the show.
Just My Luck is aimed squarely at the tweenie generation and Lindsay Lohan will draw the female fan crowd, who, in turn, will bring their boyfriends, but don’t worry guys, it’s not just another teen chick flick.
Review by LOUISE PIMM
