Although there have been many ways of understanding the word `luck´ depending the cultural background you are talking from, we can try to define a general idea about this concept that all of us mention so often, maybe too often.
Luck might refer to some kind of unpredictable events that could seriously affect our lives, events that are beyond one´s control. These events are initially purposeless but can simultaneously act on our future in a positive or negative way, that´s the reason why we add the adjective of `good´ or ``bad´ to the word luck.
The concept itself is very different from others such as coincidence, determination, chance or providence. But fate is another thing. Fate refers to destiny. It is conceptualized as the idea of a fixed future completely independent of anything a person can do. You don´t know what is going to happen but these things are undoubtedly going to happen, whatever you might do, as they are fixed in advanced.
You might wonder if there are movies related to this concept of good or bad luck, or any that might have something to do with being lucky in one´s life. Plots can´t be random, by definition. On the contrary, every small detail of a film must be perfectly designed. But some movies have tried to confront this topic.
One might be the classic Ernst Lubitsch film `If I Had a Million´ (1932) starring Gary Cooper and Charles Laughton, among others. It opens with the decision of a very rich entrepreneur who decides to give a million dollars to each one of eight randomly selected people, so that he will not have problems with his last will and his relatives´ ambitions for his heritance. The chance or good luck appears, apparently, when you receive the good news in a telephone call...
Similar in some ways is a Spanish film directed by José Maria Forqué titled `A Million in the Dustbin´ (1967) (`Un millón en la basura´) starring José Luis López Vázquez and Julia Gutiérrez Caba, among others. In this comedy, there is also a touch of tenderness and moral dilemma embedded in the plot. It´s the story of a poor street sweeper, working in the very early and cold mornings of a Spanish city in the fifties, who by chance finds a million pesetas among the litter.
He can´t believe his very good luck, or should we say his certain fate?. He decides to keep it for himself as at that moment he has serious financial problems. But his beloved wife suggests that he could prove himself to be completely honest by giving it back to its true owner...
In the opposite direction, the movie `It Could Happen to You´ (1994), starring Nicolas Cage and Bridget Fonda and directed by Andrew Bergman, also relates a moral conflict in the main character -Charlie, a good policeman- who has a very stormy relationship with his wife -Muriel, a selfish hairdresser.
One day, Charlie can´t afford to leave a tip for Yvonne, the waitress of the restaurant he usually goes to, so he offers her half of his prize if he wins from a lottery ticket he has just bought. Surprisingly, he wins. His faithful intention is to keep his promise and give half of it to Yvonne, as promised. But unlike the previous movie, his wife Muriel has a very different idea of what he should do.
He finally acts according to his conscience and he discovers that the waitress has a golden heart and buys the restaurant reserving a table everyday to give food to poor people, as she was in the past... I don´t want to ruin the rest of the film for you!.
On the subject of winning lottery prizes, which is supposed to be a very lucky event generally thought to completely change anyone´s life in a positive way, we can find another commercial movie titled `Lottery Ticket´ (2010).
Directed by Eric White and starring by Bow Wow among others, this film focuses not specifically on the main character but on the changes in other people´s behaviors. Kevin Carson, the main character, wins a 370-million-dollar lottery prize with a single ticket, and he soon realizes that his neighbors are not truthful friends but just people trying to get something from their relationship with him. Suddenly, Carson´s defects are virtues, his bad habits are examples for children from that time on, his pals demonstrate how cool he is... everything changes in his `apple polishing´ mates.
More interesting is in my opinion another movie, titled `Mr. Nobody´, directed by Jaco Van Dormael and starring Jared Leto and Sarah Polley, among others. This Belgian science fiction film develops more a philosophical point of view about fate and the vital consequences of dilemma decisions and casual circumstances. The plot has the virtue of narrating for us the different possibilities that condition the outcomes of the main character Nemo´s life.
As he is being interviewed by a journalist at the end of his days, the last human to die in a futuristic world where immortality has been achieved, he narrates his life and how it could have been from three biographical moments: at age 9, when his parents divorced, at age 15 when he fell in love and at age 34 as an adult.
So this is a small review of movies that incidentally touch topics related to luck or fate. I hope that if you have been interested by any of these works of the Seventh Art, you´ll try to watch them.
Thanksgiving Turkey
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