LOGAN LUCKY

LOGAN LUCKY is a heist comedy about two brothers from West Virginia who hook up with a bank robber in prison to steal money from the concession stands at Nascar’s top racetrack, the Charlotte Speedway in North Carolina. LOGAN LUCKY is an entertaining, suspenseful, funny crime caper with a charming subplot featuring one brother’s love for his cute young daughter. However, crime does pay, though there’s an open-ended final shot, and LOGAN LUCKY has plenty of foul language, so extreme caution is advised.

The movie opens by introducing viewers to Jimmy Logan, his brother, Clyde, who has a prosthetic hand and wrist, Jimmy’s cute young daughter, Sadie, and Jimmy and Clyde’s sister, Mellie. Jimmy is working a construction job underneath Nascar’s Charlotte Speedway in North Carolina. The job involves taking care of a big sinkhole underneath the speedway. Jimmy needs the job to pay alimony to his ex-wife, who’s re-married, and support Sadie. However, an old high school football injury has given him a limp. So, when the higher-ups at the construction company notice his limp one day, they fire Jimmy because a pre-existing medical condition is a liability.

Jimmy decides to recruit his brother and sister to rob the concession stands at Charlotte Speedway. They recruit an inmate at the local prison, Joe Bang, to help them get into the safe where the pneumatic tubes from the concession stands send the cash during each event. To do that, they need to break Joe out of prison for one day without anyone noticing.

LOGAN LUCKY is a lighthearted heist movie with a Southern twang. It’s well directed by Steven Soderbergh, who did the 2001 remake of OCEAN’S ELEVEN with George Clooney, Brad Pitt and Julia Roberts. The cast does a fine job bringing the characters to life, but the revelation here is young Farah Makenzie, who plays Jimmy’s cute daughter Sadie. Sadie is practicing for a pageant, and her father has promised to make it. So, the movie’s major subplot is whether Jimmy will keep that promise or be arrested before he can get the cash from the racetrack. The touching relationship between father and daughter gives LOGAN LUCKY some heart and helps prevent it from becoming just another heist movie about stealing money. Also, the ending has a nice twist that suggests the criminals still might not get away with their crime.