REVIEW: DVD

We're all Ben Campells. Even if you're not, you can still relate. He's a soon-to-be graduate student applying for a prestigious scholarship to Harvard School of Medicine. OK, so I'm none of the above, but underdog Ben's (Jim Sturgess) down-to-earth nonchalance coupled with good-natured ambition really evokes empathy.

He is the subtle-though-shining star of "21," a film which chronicles the triumphs and tribulations of the (fittingly) just-turned-21-year-old.

Accepted to the school, but strapped for the $300,000 tuition, the MIT senior abandons a cherished robotics contest — and his best buds — to do the unthinkable. He joins an under-the-table, card-counting, professor-led gambling group which departs for Vegas on "weekends and Christian holidays."

At first, Ben makes a wallflower background appearance. It's actually endearing, and it drives the film. After a meager birthday celebration at a local bar, he insists upon returning home immediately to work on his scholarship essay. When Mom warns him not to come home before 3 a.m., he laughs and shrugs it off with classic good humor.

Maybe introverted Ben is noticeable for this very reason. After all, the auxiliary characters — his fellow MIT students and team members — are obviously intelligent, but are flawed in that they strive too much toward wit. While the eclectic personality mix which comprises the gambling team is an obvious attempt at emotional diversity and comedic appeal, Jill, Choi, Kianna and Jimmy only pave the way for Ben not to. He doesn't try; therefore he excels.

From the moment he stumbles into the "chemistry review" classroom, Ben's innate talent is welcome, and he unknowingly takes the upper hand. Ben counts cards like no other and gains speedy support from professor and gambling coach Mickey Rosa (Kevin Spacey).

In fact, he makes such a name for his low-key self that Ben boots card-counting champ Jimmy Fisher (Jacob Pitts) from his MVP spot.

Let the minor conflict begin. Now emerge the few central dilemmas of this lax-plotted picture.

First there is the obvious Kids v. The System. Hawked by burly casino security officers, the card-counters devise covert symbols and language to evade capture. In addition to raking in hundreds of thousands in wads of green, the students also pique the surveillance acumen of notorious Cole Williams (Laurence Fishburn).

Then there is the tepid Man v. Man. After Ben takes his place at the head of the blackjack table, demotion does not bode well with somewhat hedonistic Fisher, who screams of a mean-spirited, bizzarro Ron Weasley ("Harry Potter" films). Or maybe its just the red hair.

Finally, there exists the strange melodrama between Ben and his professor. The two are opposites — and at first they seem to attract. But Mickey's ulterior motives might just prevent him from standing proudly as Ben's surrogate father-figure.

Oh, and there's also an awkward sort-of romance between Ben and collegiate cliché Jill (Kate Bosworth), but it seems so much a penciled-in plot afterthought that it's hardly worth mentioning.

I knew this DVD was approximately two hours in length, so I started to worry around one hour, 55 minutes when no savvy screenplay, warped plot twist or nail-on-the-head conclusion seemed just around the bend. But never fear, director Robert Luketic saves this film just in the nick of time. Or maybe we owe it to good old Ben.

In the end, or maybe even all along, he sits across from an admission officer in a suit-and-tie interview and implores, "I really, really need this scholarship."

We all do, in some way or another. For Ben, he's all set with his quirk, a "gifted mind," his goal, Harvard Medical School and his obstacle(s), lack of funds, lack of creativity and lack of extroversion, to name a few. He jumps hurdles with a struggling ease uncommon in a movie's main man. In the real world, he'd be hardly noticed, but when he asks his on-screen interviewer, "Did I pop off the page?" I say, "Yes."

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