Trailer: The Lucky Ones

So I just watched the trailer for The Lucky Ones (Starring Rachel McAdams, Tim Robbins, and Michael Peña) and while at first I was a little disappointed that Neil Burger's next film after The Illusionist was an Iraqi War drama (which all seem to be bombing... no pun intended). After watching the trailer I have a very different opinion and while I've never been interested to see any of those previous Iraqi Wars drams (In the Valley Of Elah, Stop-Loss, Redacted, etc.) this film seems to be very different.

First off, even though I am a "weekend Warrior" who hasn't been deployed yet or seen any action I can tell that this film has gotten some things right about what it's like to be in the military. Case-in-point, being told by strangers you're doing a good job. I have had this happen to me several times and each time it is incredibly awkward. I've even have a dude go as far as to pay for my food at Wawa because I was in uniform. From the trailer it really seems like they got that awkwardness right. Mostly because when people are saying it you can tell they have some sort of political opinion lurking behind their compliment, whether it be the stark conservative wanting to let it be know while those other hippies don't understand what you people are doing I do, and the liberal guy who wants it to be known he supports the troops but not the war.

I am happy this film is made because what it looks to have done is take three different people on separate journeys that somehow end up in the same place. Coming back from something like that is hard to relate to other people and you can feel like an alien. This is a risky choice for Burger, but this is the guy the managed to make an indie magician movie that actually ended up being able to rival Christopher Nolan's The Prestige. So maybe he'll be able to work his magic agian and turn this already dying genre into something that people may actually want to watch.