Win It All (2017) User Reviews

A Drama That Lacks Punch

[atlasmb · 6/10 · 5 May 2017]

"Win It All" is a film about a guy who is floating through life, never accepting responsibility. He is also a gambling addict, which is partly to blame for his lack of maturity. He knows he needs to reform, but he cannot muster the willpower. Like most gamblers, he is always waiting for the big payoff to pull him out of his hole, and fate sends him an opportunity to regain fiscal fitness--if he can just control his impulses.

This is a solid kernel of an idea for a film, and Jake Johnson feels committed to the part of the main character, Eddie, but the film never reaches its potential.

Much of the story feels clichéd and the characters are underdeveloped. This is most noticeable with Eddie's romantic relationship--with Eva (Aislinn Derbez, who feels like she has more to contribute). The development of their feelings for each other is cheated by many brief scenes that sometimes feel like a montage.

This may be due, in part, to editing, but the writing is the main culprit. In scenes that should carry some weight, there is inadequate exposition. It's like watching a Cliff's Notes version of a film.

The ending is abrupt and underwhelming. It's unclear if this was intentional or if it was due to the inadequate build-up of dramatic tension.

Did not expect much, did not get much either.

[stienopino · 6/10 · 10 December 2018]

This movie review can be quite short. The acting is decent and the directing is also pretty good but the part this movie is lacking is a good plot. The movie is not that long but still felt boring at sometimes. I would say this movie fits more into the drama genre but has the ingredients of a thriller while pretending to be a comedy. The plot is way to straight forward and the characters in the movie lack depth. But not everything is negative because if i find a movie bad i'll just turn it off and allthough i thought about it i watched the whole thing. (Good thing the playing time isn't that long.)

I was expecting more of a poker/gambling movie but instead you just watch a pretty normal guy with a mild gambling addiction work himself in to trouble. Then he does what every normal human being would do and he tries to get back in to the sadle of life by living a fairly normal life. It's all pretty straightforward stuff and this movie could use a bit more spice in the plot. The movie is average at best. Lacks the depth for a drama, lacks the plot for a thriller and lacks jokes for a comedy.

The whole movie feels like a flat line which is not what most people are looking for in a movie. If you're just looking for an easy straightforward movie this one suits just fine. If you're however looking for more entertainment and excitement this is not the one. You're probably better of watching a favorite classic over again.

Win it all $$$ Review

[Thatmoviesguy · 5/10 · 16 May 2017]

Jake Johnson (Let's be cops) stars as Eddie a guy who's down on his luck and addicted to gambling while trying to get his life back on track. Eddie soon gets into trouble after losing money he's supposed to be looking after as a favour. In debt and out of time, needing the money back can he 'win it all"? Co-staring is Jo Lo Truglio ( Brooklyn nine-nine).

Win it all, to me is just a low budget version of The Gambler staring Mark Wahlberg. Which I would say the latter is the better watch. Only just...

This Netflix Original film is average at best and just has no real depth to the film, a real lack of direction. Having said all of that the acting in this film is good and I felt there was good chemistry. One or two nice moments in the film but in the end you left feeling like maybe I've just wasted my time. Very forgettable. Review 5/10

Swanberg doing a Swanberg

[johnjooliver · 28 November 2020]

Really enjoyed this charming bit of film.

There is clear chemistry between the director Joe Swanberg and it's lead Jake Johnson. This is very much a filmmaker who is at the top of his game, working on a loose script, or with improvisation, flawlessly.

There could be a case of a contrived nature to some of the plot but I think the overall feel and structure of the film fits nicely into it's just under 90 minute runtime.

8/10

Don't Gamble With Inmates Money!

[iquine · 7/10 · 16 June 2020]

(Flash Review)

Step into the life of a gambling addict, Eddie. Eddie makes a pittance now and then and immediately flushes it away. Out of the blue some sketchy guy he knows, presumably from the gambling world, offers him $10K to watch his duffle bag for 6-9 months without opening it, as he is checking into prison for a brief stretch. With zero willpower, he opens the bag and finds rolls of cash and dangerously gambles with it, losing much. Yikes! With positive life options brewing such as steady job and girlfriend will he overcome his addiction and the hole he dug himself? This was a stressful, tightly scoped and lightly tense watch. Good acting with an average story; room for improvement. An enjoyable enough drama.

Not his best

[nick121235 · 6/10 · 15 September 2017]

For some reason I just didn't like this film as much as most of Swanberg's output. Straighforward plot is just not what he does best, his strong suit has always been character study, and with this film his characters were all sort of one dimensional; even the main character, though more rounded, falls a bit flat. I just feel like the story did not fit well with Joe Swanberg's easy mumblecore style, and felt a little forced.

A little flat

[gianmarcoronconi · 7/10 · 3 January 2022]

Film a little flat and banal but still exciting and entertaining that manages to make you become attached to the protagonist at stratospheric levels. The plot is a bit flat but very logical and therefore not tired, but still you notice that something is wrong.

Ending is a letdown

[ncbarari · 6/10 · 13 May 2021]

This would have been a pretty good dark dramedy about a gambler's inability to control his addiction, were it not for the totally rushed and plain ending.

Step 1: Build Plot - Step 3: Roll Credits - Step 2: ???

[LetTheJamesBegin · 4/10 · 8 January 2019]

An entertaining watch, but there's no recognizable climax to the story. There seemed to be potential, but the plot line was just a steady routine from start to finish. This was about as exciting of a story as forgetting to set your alarm clock and waking up on time anyway.

Good movie. But why do they keep mislabeling genres?

[AristarchosTheArchivist · 7/10 · 15 August 2021]

First of all: "Win it all" is not a comedy.

It's just a movie about life, and bad and good decisions - and it's actually quite earnest, despite its somewhat light-hearted approach.

So don't expect to burst into laughter every few seconds.

Gambling addiction is not a joke, and this movie shows it.

But it also shows a heart-warming story about how things change.

Jake Johnson is good at portraying a man who got himself into trouble at the worst possible time.

All actors keep it real, and it's nice to see Joe Lo Truglio not overacting once in a while.

All in all: Win It All is a decent effort that I found accidentally in the depths of the Netflix repertoire, and didn't regret watching.

But please: don't label anything not descending into tragedy a comedy.

Mislabeling only leads to disappointment with the viewer.

Gambling habits

[kosmasp · 5/10 · 14 November 2017]

Can you change a person who's addicted to gambling? Even more important, should you trust this person with money? Well you will find out once you watch this. The main character is very well cast and you get a nice supporting cast too. It's overall pretty decent for a movie of this kind but nothing special.

We also get treated to a love story and we know that there will be drama about the money. The brother figure gives this a whole different spin, though you are excused if you think there are quite a few glitches in logic to enhance drama. But that is how this works most of the time. Good enough, but nothing too exciting

A beaut

[johnpmoseley · 9/10 · 3 March 2020]

A lot of people clearly don't, but I love subtle, simple, stripped-down, basically realist stuff like this, and this is an especially good example. The ending in particular, though it could easily appear to be almost nothing if you're not paying attention, is a gem of a thing, and means I'll rewatch. I'd like to gush a bit here about what makes it so special, but I can't do it without spoiling it. It's (almost) all in the word 'dying'.

Pleasing diversion with a solid main performance

[spencergrande6 · 7/10 · 4 July 2017]

A solid bit of gambling obsession lite. It's an on-the-surface appealing mix of normal Swanberg character driven talk as plot mixed with a more conventional plot about bottoming out in order to be saved from self- destruction by way of addiction.

However, neither of those things elevates the other, and what you have is a pleasing diversion with a solid main performance from Jake Johnson. And what can only count as coup for film in the age of the streaming -- this film premiered on Netflix yet it was shot on 16mm (presumably it will never be shown that way?) but because Swanberg opted for 16 over 35 the grain shows all over the screen and constantly reminds you of its origins.

Only watched it because i like the protagonist

[rodi_elias · 2/10 · 17 August 2018]

Don't waste your time. Very simple movie... the story was not well written at all! Very disappointing

Gambling addicts may not like this melodrama; the rest of the aud will be amused.

[JohnDeSando · 13 April 2020]

"The urge to gamble is so universal and its practice is so pleasurable that I assume it must be evil." - Heywood Broun

Win It All is an unusually dark/light tale of card-gambling addiction because it subverts the usual notion that overcoming the addiction is just a McGuffin plot device. For Eddie (Jake Johnson), it is a matter serious enough to welcome us to join in his pain of avoiding the thing he loves to do and is not good at--gambling.

Eddie is asked to hold a bag while the owner does 6 months' time. Eddie is not to look in the bag, and if he is good about all this, he will earn $10,000. You can guess what happens to this compulsive gambler when he sees the money inside and foolishly convinces himself he can borrow, gamble, and return.

The pleasurable plot is that this rudderless gambler really tries to go straight, with some side roads to gambling, while his brother, Ron (Joe Lo Truglio) and sweetheart, Eva (Aislinn Derbez) try to coax him the right way. The story is never easy to figure ahead because he is such a loose cannon, capable of screwing up any good thing he starts.

Director Joe Swanberg lets us like Eddie while we're fearful of his ability to fall. We try not to invest in him, but he continues to screw up while we root. Eddie is a bit like Adam Sandler's Howard Ratner in Uncut Gems: ready to make a bad gamble at any moment but charming so we care even though we know he will disappoint us all.

The beauty of this 88 min melodrama is Eddie's character and the other characters who hope for Eddie's best. In that way Swanberg and co-writer Johnson create a semi-harrowing tale powered by character that ignores usual formula for gambling films.

Nice...

[RosanaBotafogo · 7/10 · 14 April 2024]

I love films about compulsive and extremely unlucky gamblers, I still root for the anti-hero to go wrong, hehehe, evil, I love it... Despite being a good man, what affects me is the irresponsibility of a grown man, at least he doesn't have children , to spend the pension money on bets... Excellent film, fun, I laughed after the credits, weak ending, rushed, even unfair with the drama as a whole, deserved better development, cold, no drama, no humor, stupid ending. .. Nice...

Eddie agrees to hold a backpack for an acquaintance who is going to prison. When he discovers that he has money in his bag, he ends up spending the money. When the prisoner is released, Eddie must race against time to recover all the money.

Decent watch.

[dyingrepublicofpanama · 6/10 · 8 September 2020]

Decent watch that goes in quick but with a few plot points that make your eyebrows raise.

He's down $57k. Then goes to leave the country. Goes back to play and then is only $5k down.

If this was real life he could have just told his jailbird mate that he had a nibble and forget payment. Thus saving the con $5k which he would be delighted with.

Yes gamblers gamble to the very end and never change unless they stop. But realistically he could have gotten away with just blowing 5k and coming clean

Just another movie about gambling addiction?

[jonathanmdummer · 7/10 · 17 December 2022]

I've watched quite a few movies about gambling addiction and this was a refreshing original take on it. If you enjoy these types of movies, but want to avoid the constant dread, depression, and failure then this is the movie for you.

It felt like a breath of fresh air to not have the plot shrouded in doom and gloom for once. It balances the lows with the highs very well. There's sequences of much need suspense, but also mixing in love, determination, and comedy very effectively.

It covers addiction from multiple viewpoints; the gambler, his friends, his brother that wants to help, and the better life shows itself as he tries to break the addiction cycle.

I've see mixed reviews about the ending, but in my opinion it made me come out of the movie feeling hopeful, instead of the expected doom from the gambler losing everything in the end. You know he has experienced rock bottom, seen the better life if he breaks his addiction, and finally relieved himself of the debt that he put himself in. His redemption arc doesn't feel totally complete at the end, but makes you feel hopeful for his future.

Win It All...or just become a landscape gardener?

[the_barnacle · 4/10 · 22 March 2019]

Strap yourself in folks, this is 88 minutes of your life watching a man change his life around to become boring! I'll try and do a very brief summary of the plot so you can save yourselves from watching it.

Eddie is a gambling addict who parks cars for a living. His life is turned around when his friend Michael (i'm not sure if you can call him friend...basically this guy is sitting in his kitchen when he comes home and he looks like the kind of person who would consider killing your grandmother) offers to pay him $10,000 for looking after a duffle bag while he's in prison. Then the rest of the film is Eddie gambling half the money in the duffle bag, working for his brother's landscape gardening company, getting a girlfriend, and then miraculously winning all the money back playing poker but realising that he is a changed man and wants to keep his very average life with his hot girlfriend and 9-5 job (whoopee!).

Thoughts: There was no climax, there was no disruption in his relationship with his girlfriend even though we were lead to believe early on that Eddie is not good in relationships, there was talk about making an app in a climactic moment which was never pursued, and he became a LANDSCAPE GARDENER even though he hated doing it (by the way to all the landscape gardeners out there I think it's a necessary and honourable profession that you do, however in an inspirational 'life-changing' film a landscape gardener is not what you become).

I got more pleasure eating a six-pack of stale snickers bars - and I don't really like snickers.

Afterthought: "Nick Miller: turning lemonade into lemons since 1981." - I used to like you Jake Johnson...I used to like you.

Good move, unrealistic dating possibility for the guy

[saunathansonson · 7/10 · 27 November 2023]

It's a entertaining movie, nothing fantastic but I can't say I regret spending 2 hours watching it. The one thing that bothers me is this guy who is average looking, probably makes $12/hour as a yard guy, lot of gambling problems, lands a model looking nurse likely bringing in 4x what he makes and seems to have her life on track. That is unrealistic in the real world. Woman like her in real life turn down 24 out of 25 handsome guys that are making well into six figures, so to be interested in an average looking, $12/hr guy who told her in the beginning that he was unemployed, doesn't really have anything that would be considered desirable, is unrealistic. I like my movies to be realistic. It'd be much much more realistic that he lands an average (4 out of 10), slightly overweight woman, but I guess that doesn't sell. It irks me because I know what the dating scene is like after hundreds of encounters, and this is not the dating scene.

Boring as hell

[mrkfrost · 1/10 · 3 April 2020]

Mind numbingly boring. How is this classified as a comedy. It's a pdeudo-comedydrama, a really bad one.

Toight nups.

[BennyTV · 8/10 · 20 October 2020]

This movie was quite engaging, accurate, Dark, and funny.

The chemistry between Jake and Joe was awesome- not surprising since they roll in the same circle in the tv industry.

To be honest, if you have any experience with a friend or family member with an addiction... this movie kind of hits all the right spots. Keegan was great as well... but Joe lo Truglio truly stole every scene he was in. Very nice display of his range.

Good movie.

Enjoyable

[timthorn-74960 · 7/10 · 5 August 2021]

This is simply a funny but realistic story. The ending is lacking a satisfying climax. The rating at the moment might discourage some viewers, but if you are looking for a purely enjoyable movie, here you go.

WASTE OF TIME

[aliurganci · 1/10 · 28 December 2018]

One of the worst movies ever. There is nothing good about this movie. Even I could film this movie with my Iphone. Don't watch it. If you like these kind of movies tbough, I reccomend you watch "Her Sey Cok Guzel Olacak" which is a Turkish movie and is way better than this one.

Inaccurate

[jonolson-93923 · 5/10 · 15 September 2021]

There's a scene at the big poker game where a player bets, then the main character says, "I'll raise." The guy who bet says "it's better to fold." The main character then thinks about it and says "alright I fold." Anyone who plays poker (especially those kind of stakes) knows you are obligated to raise once you verbally say you raise. In a real game the dealer would have called that out and forced him to raise.

This may seem like a minor flaw, but it really bothers me when a movie about gambling is written by someone who doesn't actually know gambling.