21 does not offer audiences a winning hand.
It has some strong performances, most notably by Jim Sturgess (Across the Universe), Laurence Fishburne and Kevin Spacey, back to doing what he does best: playing the arrogant villain. It also has weak ones, particularly that of Kate Bosworth, who strains credulity as an MIT super-intellect. She's a cardboard cutout, as are most of the other supposedly brainiac students. The film is as slick and slight as a deck of cards.

The story, based on Ben Mezrich's best-selling Bringing Down the House, strives to be suspenseful and exciting, but instead is repetitive, implausible and overlong.

Ben Campbell (Sturgess) is a brilliant MIT student who has plans to go to medical school. He is working at a low-paying job and has few prospects to amass the sizable tuition needed for his years in med school. He is approached by his math professor (Spacey) to take part in a card-counting gambling scheme. Ben initially resists, but of course, we know he's going to take him up on the offer.

It helps that the object of his desires, Jill (Bosworth), is in on the scheme. With Spacey as their manipulative "coach," the group goes off regularly to Las Vegas and wins big bucks at blackjack by counting cards.

Ben is seduced by his glitzy weekends in Vegas, a budding romance with Jill and the massive amounts of cash he is piling up. He begins to callously leave behind his longtime friends.

Of course, Ben gets cocky and pushes his limits. Of course, it's only a matter of time before the whole scam comes crashing down, under the watchful eye of a shrewd casino security enforcer (Fishburne). Of course, the professor has his revenge. And the finale is far too long in coming. In fact, the film feels like it has a few endings, which makes it even more tedious. It doesn't help that blackjack is hardly a spectator sport.

While not exactly a zero, 21 lags and fails to measure up dramatically.