Good Luck Chuck has plenty of sex and raunchiness, but it's light on the comedy.
If it wasn't for Alba, who emerges as a naturally sweet and perky real person among all these cardboard characters, or the penguins that her character works with at the zoo, this film wouldn't have much besides all those sex scenes. The penguins are a welcome relief from all the tedious nonsense that this film expects us to swallow. Apart from the good luck charm of sleeping with Chuck, the only other plot element is that Chuck is smitten with Cam (Alba), and has a dilemma. If he sleeps with her and the charm is true, then it becomes a curse for him and he loses her. But what if the charm isn't true? He has to find out, his friend convinces him.
No one, however, convinced Cook to behave like a stalker--so poorly that it doesn't just set up yet another contradiction in the film, but makes you question why this normal woman didn't get a restraining order. There are plenty of holes in this film, and the ones that Chuck doesn't fill are unfortunately in the plot or in character development. There are some laugh-out-loud moments, but not nearly enough of them, and certainly not enough to balance the film's essentially adolescent point-of-view. A film like "Superbad" put the writing and concept first; with this one, sex gets the nod, and it shows. I laughed like crazy with "Superbad." This one? Only occasionally, though the flashback "spin-the-bottle" beginning was certainly promising.
Video:
"Good Luck Chuck" was transferred to disc using MPEG-4 codec at 1.85:1 aspect ratio. The 1080p picture looks fantastic, and the colors are perfectly saturated so that you really notice different skin tones in all those writhing body scenes. Black levels are strong, and there's a superb amount of detail. Too much, in some scenes, as when you can see every hair popping out of every mole. Yikes.
Audio:
The featured audio is a lively English PCM 7.1 that has a nice resonance and great distribution of sound across the speakers for a nice, broad audio experience. It seems to be recorded and encoded at a lower level than usual, though, so you might find yourself watching it at a higher volume. The non-HD option is an English Dolby Digital Surround EX that's just a small step down, with subtitles in English and Spanish.
Extras:
The commentary track by Cook, Helfrich, Stolberg, and producer Mike Karz is a bit of a free-for-all, with Cook and Karz doing most of the talking. They joke as they re-watch the unrated uncut version, but they never really sink to the level of the film. It's an average commentary at best.
Of the seven short features (total runtime of 30 minutes or so), "All About Penguins" is by far the most entertaining--which tells you something about the film, or certainly my response to it. There's a dumb one on "Frank," which is an in-character featurette about one of the penguins. Then there's one titled "Polymastia," which brings in the woman with three breasts from the film, one on "Kama Sutra" which deals with the sexcapades, "Eleanor Skepple" (the large woman, who's a perfectly sweet non-actress from Texas), "Good Luck Chuckles" which is a throwaway summary feature, and the only other decent feature on "The Real Good Luck Chuck."
Rounding out the bonus features is that take-you-to-a-scene "Sex Matrix," some ad libs (call it a gag reel) and 12 deleted/alternate scenes that have no "good stuff," in case you're wondering. Then there's a "musical montage" that's about as throwaway as the personalized bookmarks feature is-unless you want to program the thing to show only the sex scenes, or (in my case) only the penguins.
Bottom Line:
As sex comedies go, "Good Luck Chuck" has plenty of sex and raunchiness, but it's light on the comedy. Mixing the romantic-comedy and raunchy sex-comedy genres might be possible, but screenwriter Josh Stolberg and director Mark Helfrich don't make it work. The result is a schizoid bit of filmmaking that seems like a sexual Jekyll and Hyde.
No one, however, convinced Cook to behave like a stalker--so poorly that it doesn't just set up yet another contradiction in the film, but makes you question why this normal woman didn't get a restraining order. There are plenty of holes in this film, and the ones that Chuck doesn't fill are unfortunately in the plot or in character development. There are some laugh-out-loud moments, but not nearly enough of them, and certainly not enough to balance the film's essentially adolescent point-of-view. A film like "Superbad" put the writing and concept first; with this one, sex gets the nod, and it shows. I laughed like crazy with "Superbad." This one? Only occasionally, though the flashback "spin-the-bottle" beginning was certainly promising.
Video:
"Good Luck Chuck" was transferred to disc using MPEG-4 codec at 1.85:1 aspect ratio. The 1080p picture looks fantastic, and the colors are perfectly saturated so that you really notice different skin tones in all those writhing body scenes. Black levels are strong, and there's a superb amount of detail. Too much, in some scenes, as when you can see every hair popping out of every mole. Yikes.
Audio:
The featured audio is a lively English PCM 7.1 that has a nice resonance and great distribution of sound across the speakers for a nice, broad audio experience. It seems to be recorded and encoded at a lower level than usual, though, so you might find yourself watching it at a higher volume. The non-HD option is an English Dolby Digital Surround EX that's just a small step down, with subtitles in English and Spanish.
Extras:
The commentary track by Cook, Helfrich, Stolberg, and producer Mike Karz is a bit of a free-for-all, with Cook and Karz doing most of the talking. They joke as they re-watch the unrated uncut version, but they never really sink to the level of the film. It's an average commentary at best.
Of the seven short features (total runtime of 30 minutes or so), "All About Penguins" is by far the most entertaining--which tells you something about the film, or certainly my response to it. There's a dumb one on "Frank," which is an in-character featurette about one of the penguins. Then there's one titled "Polymastia," which brings in the woman with three breasts from the film, one on "Kama Sutra" which deals with the sexcapades, "Eleanor Skepple" (the large woman, who's a perfectly sweet non-actress from Texas), "Good Luck Chuckles" which is a throwaway summary feature, and the only other decent feature on "The Real Good Luck Chuck."
Rounding out the bonus features is that take-you-to-a-scene "Sex Matrix," some ad libs (call it a gag reel) and 12 deleted/alternate scenes that have no "good stuff," in case you're wondering. Then there's a "musical montage" that's about as throwaway as the personalized bookmarks feature is-unless you want to program the thing to show only the sex scenes, or (in my case) only the penguins.
Bottom Line:
As sex comedies go, "Good Luck Chuck" has plenty of sex and raunchiness, but it's light on the comedy. Mixing the romantic-comedy and raunchy sex-comedy genres might be possible, but screenwriter Josh Stolberg and director Mark Helfrich don't make it work. The result is a schizoid bit of filmmaking that seems like a sexual Jekyll and Hyde.
Average user rating (1-5):
[release]22503[/release]