21 | |
---|---|
Directed by | Robert Luketic |
Produced by | |
Written by | |
Based on | Bringing Down the House by Ben Mezrich |
Starring | |
Music by | David Sardy |
Cinematography | Russell Carpenter |
Edited by | Elliot Graham |
| |
Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
| |
123 minutes | |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $35 million |
Box office | $157.9 million |
- Is 21 Blackjack A True Story Free
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- Is 21 Blackjack A True Story Movie
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21 is a 2008 American heistdrama film directed by Robert Luketic and starring Jim Sturgess, Kevin Spacey, Laurence Fishburne, Kate Bosworth, Liza Lapira, Jacob Pitts, Aaron Yoo, and Kieu Chinh. The film is inspired by the true story of the MIT Blackjack Team as told in Bringing Down the House, the best-selling book by Ben Mezrich. Despite its largely mixed reviews and controversy over the film's casting choices, 21 was a box office success, and was the number one film in the United States and Canada during its first and second weekends of release.
'21' is a movie that was well produced, enjoyable and one that made me want to learn more about the M.I.T. Blackjack teams. But the more I looked into the six M.I.T. Students, the more I found that the movie should be tagged as 'very loosely based on a true story.'
- 4Reception
- Is 21 blackjack a true story Trucks stops will be permitted to hold 10 machines. View locations of IOP. Twenty-One is first recorded in the 18th century under the name Vingt-Un or Vingt-et-Un, showing it to be of French provenance.
- He lost his virginity at age 21 to a man. He says that in his true Hollywood story episode (its a show on E!).
- R/reddit.com: The original subreddit, now archived. Press J to jump to the feed. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts.
Plot[edit]
Ben Campbell (Jim Sturgess), a mathematics major at MIT, is accepted into Harvard Medical School but cannot afford the $300,000 tuition. He applies for the prestigious Robinson Scholarship which would cover the entire cost. However, despite having an MCAT score of 44 and high grades, he faces fierce competition, and is told by the director that the scholarship will only go to whichever student dazzles him. Back at MIT, Professor Micky Rosa (Kevin Spacey) challenges Ben with the Monty Hall Problem which he solves successfully. After looking at Ben's 97% score on his latest non-linear equations test, Rosa invites Ben to join his blackjack team, which consists of fellow students Choi, Fisher, Jill, and Kianna. Using card counting and covert signalling, they are able to increase their probability of winning while at casinos, leading them to earn substantial profits. Over many weekends, the team is flown to Las Vegas and Ben comes to enjoy his luxurious lifestyle as a so-called big player. The team is impressed by Ben's skill, but Fisher becomes jealous and fights him while drunk, leading Rosa to expel him. Meanwhile, the head of security, Cole Williams (Laurence Fishburne), has been monitoring the team and begins to turn his attention to Ben.
Ben's devotion to blackjack causes him to neglect his role in an engineering competition, which estranges him from his friends. During the next trip to Las Vegas, he is emotionally distracted and fails to walk away from the table when signaled, causing him to lose his earnings of $200,000. Rosa is angered and quits the team, demanding that Ben must repay $200,000. Ben and three of the students decide that they will continue to play blackjack without Rosa, but they are caught by Williams, whom Rosa tipped off. Williams beats up Ben and warns him not to return.
Ben learns that he is ineligible for graduation because his course taught by Professor Rosa is marked as incomplete. Furthermore, his winnings are stolen from his dormitory room. Suspecting Rosa, Ben confers with the other blackjack students, and they persuade Rosa to make a final trip to Las Vegas before the casinos install biometric software. The team puts on disguises and returns to Planet Hollywood, winning $640,000 before they are spotted by Williams. Rosa flees with the bag of chips, jumping onto a limousine, but discovers that it's a setup to give him to Williams. It is revealed that Ben and Williams made a deal to lure Rosa to Las Vegas so that Williams may capture and beat him, because Williams has past grievances against him. Williams proceeds to hold Rosa hostage and subject him to beatings. In exchange, Williams allows Ben to play for one more night in Las Vegas, enjoying immunity from capture. However, as Ben is leaving with his earnings, Williams betrays him and takes the bag of chips at gunpoint. Ben protests, and Williams explains that he needs retirement funds, whereas intelligent people like Ben will always find a way to succeed. The film ends with Ben recounting the entire tale to the dazzled scholarship director.
Cast[edit]
- Jim Sturgess as Ben Campbell
- Kevin Spacey as Professor Micky Rosa
- Kate Bosworth as Jill Taylor
- Laurence Fishburne as Cole Williams
- Aaron Yoo as Choi
- Liza Lapira as Kianna
- Jacob Pitts as Fisher
- Jack McGee as Terry
- Josh Gad as Miles Connoly
- Sam Golzari as Cam Azazi
- Helen Carey as Ellen Campbell
- Jack Gilpin as Bob Phillips
- Spencer Garrett as Stemple
- Jeff Ma (as Jeffrey Ma) as Planet Hollywood Dealer Jeff (the person upon whom the story was based).
- Kris Williams as Jill's Friend
- Kieu Chinh as Poker player
Production[edit]
The filming of 21 began in March 2007. Principal filming of the Las Vegas scenes took place at the Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino, the Red Rock Casino, and the Hard Rock Casino in Las Vegas. Filming also took place at Harvard Medical School, Chinatown, in Cambridge, and the Christian Science Center in Boston, Massachusetts. As Massachusetts Institute of Technology did not allow filming on campus, the MIT school and dorm interiors, the gymnasium, and the alumni reception were all shot at Boston University.
Reception[edit]
Critical response[edit]
21 received mixed reviews from critics. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 35% of 167 critics gave the film a positive review, for an average rating of 5.2/10. The site's critical consensus reads that '21 could have been a fascinating study had it not supplanted the true story on which it is based with mundane melodrama.'[1]Metacritic reported the film had an average score of 48 out of 100, based on 29 reviews.[2]
Box office[edit]
In its opening weekend, the film grossed $24,105,943 in 2,648 theaters in the United States and Canada, averaging $9,103 per venue and ranking first at the box office.[3] The film was also the number one film in its second weekend of release, losing 36% of its audience, grossing $15,337,418, expanding to 2,653 theaters, and averaging $5,781 per venue. The film dropped to third place in its third weekend, losing 32% of its audience, grossing $10,470,173, expanding to 2,736 theaters, and averaging $3,827 per venue. By the fourth weekend it fell to sixth place, losing 47% of its audience, grossing $5,520,362 expanding to 2,903 theaters, and averaging $1,902 per venue.
By the end of its theatrical run, the film grossed a total of $157,802,470 worldwide—$81,159,365 in the United States and Canada and $76,643,105 in other territories, against a budget estimated at $35 million.[4]
Casting controversy[edit]
A race-based controversy arose over the decision to make the majority of the characters white Americans, even though the main players in the book Bringing Down the House, upon which the film 21 is based, were mainly Asian-Americans.[5] The lead role was given to London-born Jim Sturgess, who required a dialect coach to speak with an American accent.[6]
Jeff Ma, who was the real-life inspiration for the character Ben Campbell and served as a consultant on the film, was attacked as being a 'race traitor' on several blogs for not insisting that his character be Asian-American. In response, Ma said, 'I'm not sure they understand how little control I had in the movie-making process; I didn't get to cast it.'[7] Ma said that the controversy was 'overblown' and that the important aspect is that a talented actor would portray him.[8] Ma, who is Chinese American, told USA Today, 'I would have been a lot more insulted if they had chosen someone who was Japanese or Korean, just to have an Asian playing me.'[9]
Nick Rogers of The Enterprise wrote, 'The real-life students mostly were Asian-Americans, but 21whitewashes its cast and disappointingly lumps its only Asian-American actors (Aaron Yoo and Liza Lapira) into one-note designations as the team's kleptomaniac and a slot-playing 'loser.'[10]
The Media Action Network for Asian Americans (MANAA) reported on their web site: 'After the 'white-washing' issue was raised on Entertainment Weekly's web site, [21] producer Dana Brunetti wrote: 'Believe me, I would have LOVED to cast Asians in the lead roles, but the truth is, we didn't have access to any bankable Asian-American actors that we wanted.'[11]
Home media[edit]
21 was released on DVD and Blu-ray in Region 1 on July 21, 2008.[12]
Reaction from casinos[edit]
In pre-production, the producers and the book's original writers predicted that the Vegas casinos would be unhelpful, as a film that told viewers the basics of card counting might hurt their bottom line. A featurette included with the DVD completely and accurately describes the 'Hi-Lo' system used by the MIT Blackjack Club and by Rosa's team in the film.
In fact, the writers were surprised when told by the producers that MGM Studios would finance the film, though all 'MGM' casinos (including one used by the real MIT Blackjack Team) are owned by MGM Resorts International and are no longer related to MGM Studios. In reality, as another DVD featurette reveals, the casinos (including MGM Resorts) saw the film as an attention-getter; people who saw it would be encouraged to go to Vegas and play: some just for fun and some attempting to count cards but failing to learn or memorize the entire strategy or making too many mistakes. The film withheld critical strategy details (such as the conversion from the 'running count' to a 'true count'), and most beginning card counters underestimate the number and value of the mistakes they make.
Soundtrack[edit]
21 | |
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Soundtrack album by Various Artists | |
Released | |
Genre | Soundtrack |
Label | Columbia |
Singles from 21 - Music from the Motion Picture | |
|
Professional ratings | |
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Review scores | |
Source | Rating |
AllMusic | [13] |
The soundtrack was released at the same time as the film.[13]
- The Rolling Stones—'You Can't Always Get What You Want' (Remixed by Soulwax) (6:07)
- MGMT—'Time to Pretend' (Super Clean Version) (4:20)
- LCD Soundsystem—'Big Ideas' (5:41)
- D. Sardy featuring Liela Moss—'Giant' (3:42)
- Amon Tobin—'Always' (3:38)
- Peter Bjorn and John—'Young Folks' (4:37)
- Shook One —'Soul Position' (4:16)
- Get Shakes—'Sister Self Doubt' (4:22)
- The Aliens—'I Am The Unknown' (5:27)
- Rihanna—'Shut Up and Drive' (3:34)
- Knivez Out—'Alright' (3:31)
- Domino—'Tropical Moonlight' (3:28)
- Unkle—'Hold My Hand' (4:58)
- Mark Ronson featuring Kasabian—'L.S.F. (Lost Souls Forever)' (3:32)
- Broadcast—'Tender Buttons' (2:51)
- Other tracks
- Although it is not included in the soundtrack, Moby's 'Slippin' Away' (Axwell Vocal Remix) plays in the scene when Ben is passing through airport security.
- The song 'Everybody Get Dangerous' by Weezer was also featured in the film, but not included on the soundtrack since it was not yet released. It would later be released on Weezer's 2008 record, The Red Album. It is played on a distant radio when the team is in a poker club.
- The songs 'I Want You to Want Me' by Cheap Trick and 'Music is Happiness' by The Octopus Project were also featured in the film but not on the soundtrack album.
- The song 'Magnificent' by Estelle (feat. Kardinal Offishall) was also featured in the film but not on the soundtrack album. It's played approximately 58 minutes in, after the Weezer song, in the scene where Ben buys Jill a beer. It's subtle, and has a reggae beat.
- In the promotional trailers, 'Break on Through (To the Other Side)' by The Doors was used.
- During the restaurant scene where the team explains to Ben how they work, 'Home' by Great Northern can be heard playing in the background.
- The song 'Again with the Subtitles' by Texas artist Yppah is another uncredited song in the film.
- The track played as the team makes off at the end of the film is 'Rito a Los Angeles' by Giuseppe De Luca, which features part of the main riff of 'In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida'. This track is also used in Ocean's Twelve, the first sequel to the caper film Ocean's Eleven, about actually robbing casinos in Vegas.
- My Mathematical Mind by Spoon was featured in the trailers.
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ^'21 Movie Reviews, Pictures - Rotten Tomatoes'. Rotten Tomatoes. Archived from the original on 22 November 2009. Retrieved June 21, 2018.
- ^'21 (2008): Reviews'. Metacritic. Archived from the original on 2 April 2008. Retrieved 2008-04-02.
- ^'21 (2008) - Weekend Box Office Results'. Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2008-04-06.
- ^'21 (2008)'. Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2008-04-28.
- ^'Real MIT Blackjack Team - 21 Movie True Story'. chasingthefrog.com. Retrieved March 31, 2013.
- ^Janusonis, Michael. 'Movies: 21 star Jim Sturgess got a crash course in card counting'. projo.com. Archived from the original on April 11, 2008. Retrieved 29 May 2015.
- ^Justin Berton (2008-03-27). 'Hollywood deals Jeff Ma a good hand with '21''. San Francisco Chronicle. Archived from the original on 29 March 2008. Retrieved 2008-03-29.
- ^Berry, Jillian A. (March 14, 2008). 'INTERVIEW MIT, Vegas, Hollywood'. The Tech. Retrieved March 31, 2013.
- ^Bowles, Scott (2008-03-26). 'New film '21' counts on the real deal for inspiration'. USA Today. Retrieved 2010-04-23.
- ^Nick Rogers (2008-03-26). 'When the stakes are high, '21' folds'. The Enterprise. Archived from the original on 2008-04-01. Retrieved 2008-03-29.
- ^'CONTROVERSY STILL SURROUNDS DVD RELEASE OF MOVIE '21''. manaa.org. Archived from the original on 2013-10-04. Retrieved March 31, 2013.
- ^'21 (Single-Disc Edition) (2008)'. Amazon.com. Retrieved March 31, 2013.
- ^ abBrown, Marisa. '21 [Original Soundtrack]'. AllMusic. Retrieved 2008-04-02.
External links[edit]
- 21 on IMDb
- 21 at Rotten Tomatoes
- 21 at Metacritic
- 21 at Box Office Mojo
- 21 at AllMovie
- Photos of the filming of 21 near the campus of MIT: 123456
- Official world wide release dates with links to different national sites
Retrieved from 'https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=21_(2008_film)&oldid=934237277'
The MIT Blackjack Team was a group of students and ex-students from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard Business School, Harvard University, and other leading colleges who used card counting techniques and more sophisticated strategies to beat casinos at blackjack worldwide. The team and its successors operated successfully from 1979 through the beginning of the 21st century. Many other blackjack teams have been formed around the world with the goal of beating the casinos.
- 3'Mr. M' meets Bill Kaplan
- 8In the media
Blackjack and card counting[edit]
Blackjack can be legally beaten by a skilled player. Beyond the basic strategy of when to hit and when to stand, individual players can use card counting, shuffle tracking or hole carding to improve their odds. Since the early 1960s a large number of card counting schemes have been published, and casinos have adjusted the rules of play in an attempt to counter the most popular methods. The idea behind all card counting is that, because a low card is usually bad and a high card usually good, and as cards already seen since the last shuffle cannot be at the top of the deck and thus drawn, the counter can determine the high and low cards that have already been played. He or she thus knows the probability of getting a high card (10,J,Q,K,A) as compared to a low card (2,3,4,5,6).
In 1980, six MIT students and residents of the Burton-Conner House at MIT taught themselves card-counting. They traveled to Atlantic City during the spring break to win their fortune. The group went their separate ways when most of them graduated in May of that year. Most never gambled again, but some of them maintained an avid interest in card counting and remained in Cambridge, Massachusetts. They offered a course on blackjack for MIT's January, 1980 Independent Activities Period (IAP), during which classes may be offered on almost any subject.
First MIT blackjack 'bank'[edit]
In late November 1979, a professional blackjack player contacted one of the card-counting students, J.P. Massar, after seeing a notice for the blackjack course. He proposed forming a new group to go to Atlantic City to take advantage of the New Jersey Casino Control Commission's recent ruling that made it illegal for the Atlantic City casinos to ban card counters. Instead, casinos would have to ban players individually.
The group of four players, a professional gambler, and an investor who put up most of their capital ($5,000), went to Atlantic City in late December. They recruited more MIT students as players at the January blackjack class. They played intermittently through May 1980 and increased their capital four-fold, but were nonetheless more like a loose group sharing capital than a team with consistent strategies and quality control.
'Mr. M' meets Bill Kaplan[edit]
In May 1980, J. P. Massar, known as 'Mr. M' in the History Channel documentary, overheard a conversation about professional blackjack at a Chinese restaurant in Cambridge. He introduced himself to the speaker, Bill Kaplan, a 1980 Harvard MBA graduate who had run a successful blackjack team in Las Vegas three years earlier. Kaplan had earned his BA at Harvard in 1977 and delayed his admission to Harvard Business School for a year, when he moved to Las Vegas and formed a team of blackjack players using his own research and statistical analysis of the game. Using funds he received on graduation as Harvard's outstanding scholar-athlete, Kaplan generated more than a 35 fold rate of return in fewer than nine months of play.[1]
Kaplan continued to run his Las Vegas blackjack team as a sideline while attending Harvard Business School but, by the time of his graduation in May 1980, the players were so 'burnt out' in Nevada they were forced to hit the international circuit. Not feeling he could continue to manage the team successfully while they traveled throughout Europe and elsewhere, encountering different rules, playing conditions, and casino practices, Kaplan parted ways with his teammates, who then splintered into multiple small playing teams in pursuit of more favorable conditions throughout the world.
Kaplan observes Massar and friends in action[edit]
After meeting Kaplan and hearing about his blackjack successes, Massar asked Kaplan if he was interested in going with a few of Massar's blackjack-playing friends to Atlantic City to observe their play. Given the fortuitous timing (Kaplan's parting with his Las Vegas team), he agreed to go in the hopes of putting together a new local team that he could train and manage.
Kaplan observed Massar and his teammates playing for a weekend in Atlantic City. He noted that each of the players used a different, and overcomplicated, card counting strategy. This resulted in error rates that undermined the benefits of the more complicated strategies. Upon returning to Cambridge, Kaplan detailed the problems he observed to Massar.
Kaplan capitalizes a new team[edit]
Kaplan said he would back a team but it had to be run as a business with formal management procedures, a required counting and betting system, strict training and player approval processes, and careful tracking of all casino play. A couple of the players were initially averse to the idea. They had no interest in having to learn a new playing system, being put through 'trial by fire' checkout procedures before being approved to play, being supervised in the casinos, or having to fill out detailed player sheets (such as casino, cash in and cash out totals, time period, betting strategy and limits, and the rest) for every playing session. However, their keen interest in the game coupled with Kaplan's successful track record won out.
The newly capitalised 'bank' of the MIT Blackjack Team started on 1 August 1980. The investment stake was $89,000, with both outside investors and players putting up the capital. Ten players, including Kaplan, Massar, Jonathan, Goose, and 'Big Dave' (aka 'coach', to distinguish from the Dave in the first round) played on this bank. Ten weeks later they more than doubled the original stake. Profits per hour played at the tables were $162.50, statistically equivalent to the projected rate of $170/hour detailed in the investor offering prospectus. Per the terms of the investment offering, players and investors split the profits with players paid in proportion to their playing hours and computer simulated win rates. Over the ten-week period of this first bank, players, mostly undergraduates, earned an average of over $80/hour while investors achieved an annualized return in excess of 250%.
Strategy and techniques[edit]
The team often recruited students through flyers and the players' friends from college campuses across the country. The team tested potential members to find out if they were suitable candidates and, if they were, the team thoroughly trained the new members for free. Fully trained players had to pass an intense 'trial by fire,' consisting of playing through 8 six-deck shoes with almost perfect play, and then undergo further training, supervision, and similar check-outs in actual casino play until they could become full stakes players.
The group combined individual play with a team approach of counters and big players to maximize opportunities and disguise the betting patterns that card counting produces. In a 2002 interview in Blackjack Forum magazine,[2] John Chang, an MIT undergrad who joined the team in late 1980 (and became MIT team co-manager in the mid-1980s and 1990s), reported that, in addition to classic card counting and blackjack team techniques, at various times the group used advanced shuffle and ace tracking techniques. While the MIT team's card counting techniques can give players an overall edge of about 2 percent, some of the MIT team's methods have been established as gaining players an overall edge of about 4 percent.[citation needed] In his interview, Chang reported that the MIT team had difficulty attaining such edges in actual play, and their overall results had been best with straight card counting.
The MIT Team's approach was originally developed by Al Francesco, elected by professional gamblers as one of the original seven inductees into the Blackjack Hall of Fame. Blackjack team play was first written about by Ken Uston, an early member of Al Francesco's teams. Uston's book on blackjack team play, Million Dollar Blackjack, was published shortly before the founding of the first MIT team. Kaplan enhanced Francesco's team methods and used them for the MIT team. The team concept enabled players and investors to leverage both their time and money, reducing their 'risk of ruin' while also making it more difficult for casinos to detect card counting at their tables.
Team history 1980–1990[edit]
The MIT Blackjack Team continued to play throughout the 1980s, growing to as many as 35 players in 1984 with a capitalization of as much as $350,000. Having played and run successful teams since 1977, Kaplan reached a point in late 1984 where he could not show his face in any casino without being followed by the casino personnel in search of his team members. As a consequence he decided to fall back on his growing real estate investment and development company, his 'day job' since 1980, and stopped managing the team. He continued for another year or so as an occasional player and investor in the team, now being run by Massar, Chang and Bill Rubin, a player who joined the team in 1984.
The MIT Blackjack Team ran at least 22 partnerships in the time period from late 1979 through 1989. At least 70 people played on the team in some capacity (either as counters, Big Players, or in various supporting roles) over that time span. Every partnership was profitable during this time period, after paying all expenses as well as the players' and managers' share of the winnings, with returns to investors ranging from 4%/year to over 300%/year.
Strategic Investments 1992–1993[edit]
Is 21 Blackjack A True Story Free
In 1992, Bill Kaplan, J.P. Massar, and John Chang decided to capitalize on the opening of Foxwoods Casino in nearby Connecticut, where they planned to train new players. Acting as the General Partner, they formed a Massachusetts Limited Partnership in June 1992 called Strategic Investments to bankroll the new team. Structured similar to the numerous real estate development limited partnerships that Kaplan had formed, the limited partnership raised a million dollars, significantly more money than any of their previous teams, with a method based on Edward Thorp's high low system. It involved three players: a big player, a controller, and a spotter. The spotter checked when the deck went positive with card counting, the controller would bet small constantly, wasting money, and verifying the spotter's count. Once the controller found a positive, he would signal to the big player. He would make a massive bet, and win big. Confident with this new funding, the three general partners ramped up their recruitment and training efforts to capitalize on the opportunity.
Over the next two years, the MIT Team grew to nearly 80 players, including groups and players in Cambridge, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, California, Illinois, and Washington. Sarah McCord, who joined the team in 1983 as an MIT student and later moved to California, was added as a partner soon after SI was formed and became responsible for training and recruitment of West Coast players.
At various times, there were nearly 30 players playing simultaneously at different casinos around the world, including Native American casinos throughout the country, Las Vegas, Atlantic City, Canada, and island locations. Never before had casinos throughout the world seen such an organized and scientific onslaught directed at the game. While the profits rolled in, so did the 'heat' from the casinos, and many MIT Team members were identified and barred. These members were replaced by fresh players from MIT, Harvard, and other colleges and companies, and play continued. Eventually, investigators hired by casinos realized that many of those they had banned had addresses in or near Cambridge, and the connection to MIT and a formalized team became clear. The detectives obtained copies of recent MIT yearbooks and added photographs from it to their image database.
With its leading players banned from most casinos and other more lucrative investment opportunities opening up at the end of the recession, Strategic Investments paid out its substantial earnings to players and investors and dissolved its partnership on December 31, 1993.
Blackjack 21 Blackjackist
1994 and forward[edit]
After the dissolution of Strategic Investments, a few of the players took their winnings and split off into two independent groups. The Amphibians were primarily led by Semyon Dukach, with Dukach as the big player, Katie Lilienkamp (a controller), and Andy Bloch (a spotter). The other team was the Reptiles, led by Mike Aponte, Manlio Lopez and Wes Atamian. These teams had various legal structures, and at times million dollar banks and 50+ players. By 2000 the 15+ year reign of the MIT Blackjack Teams came to an end as players drifted into other pursuits.
In 1999, a member of the Amphibians won at Max Rubin's 3rd Annual Blackjack Ball competition. The event was featured in an October 1999 Cigar Aficionado article, which said the winner earned the unofficial title 'Most Feared Man in the Casino Business'.[3]
In the media[edit]
Books[edit]
- A variety of stories about a few of the players from the MIT Blackjack Team formed the basis of The New York Times best-sellingBringing Down the House, written by Ben Mezrich. While originally marketed as nonfiction, Mezrich later admitted characters and stories in the book were mostly fictive and composites of players and stories he had heard about through hearsay. The private investigation firm referred to as Plymouth in Bringing Down the House was Griffin Investigations.[4]
- Mezrich wrote a follow-up book, Busting Vegas, which took even greater liberty with the actual happenings of the team. Many events in this book were at least partly based on incidents that occurred during the team's Strategic Investments era.[5]
- Jeffrey Ma wrote a book titled The House Advantage: Playing the Odds to Win Big in Business about his time on the 1994 MIT blackjack team.
- Nathaniel Tilton, a student of former MIT team captains Mike Aponte and Semyon Dukach, authored The Blackjack Life detailing his experiences playing and being trained by the MIT Blackjack Team players.[6]
Films[edit]
- The 2004 film, The Last Casino, is loosely based on this premise and features three students and a professor counting cards in Ontario and Quebec.[7]
- The 2008 movie, 21, inspired by Bringing Down the House and produced by and starring Kevin Spacey and Jim Sturgess, was released on March 28, 2008 by Columbia Pictures. Jeff Ma and Henry Houh, former players on the team, appear in the movie as casino dealers, and Bill Kaplan appears in a cameo in the background of the underground Chinese gambling parlor scene. The script took significant artistic license with events, with most of its plot being invented for the movie, hence it refers to being 'inspired by true events' rather than 'based on true events.' One of the most significant departures from reality was the portrayal of the team being run by a professor (the Kevin Spacey character), when in reality the team was always run by students and alumni. The characters in the movie were also fictionalized amalgams of various players throughout the years of the team's existence - for example, the character Choi is very loosely (and inaccurately) based on Johnny Chang, and the character Ben Campbell, is an amalgam of numerous players, with the opening scene based on Big Dave's interview, and subsequent admission to Harvard Medical School, where much of the interview revolved around his participation on the team.
Television[edit]
- The Mysteries at the Museum series on the Travel Channel featured the story of the MIT Blackjack Team in the episode titled 'Siamese Twins, Assassin Umbrella, Capone's Cell'.
- The story of the MIT Blackjack Team, in its incarnation as Strategic Investments, was told in The History Channel documentary, Breaking Vegas, directed by Bruce David Klein.
- The Bringing Down The House period was featured on episodes of the Game Show Network documentary series, Anything to Win, and HBO's Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel (episode 116).
- The BBC documentary, Making Millions the Easy Way, addressed the Bringing Down the House period as part of the renowned 'Horizon' strand (directed by Johanna Gibbon), told the story of a Strategic Investments breakaway group, and revealed the science behind the winning formula.
- 'Double Down', an episode of Numb3rs concerned a counting group, led by a High School teacher, which launders money through casino winnings.
Other[edit]
Several members of the two teams have used their expertise to start public speaking careers as well as businesses teaching others how to count cards. For example:
Blackjack 21 Free Game
- Mike Aponte of the Reptiles co-founded a company with former MIT Blackjack Team member David Irvine called the Blackjack Institute.
- Semyon Dukach of the Amphibians founded Blackjack Science.
References[edit]
- ^'How a team of students beat the casinos'. BBC.com. Retrieved 26 May 2014.
- ^Blackjack Forum interview with Johnny Chang
- ^The Twenty One Club: The annual blackjack ball hosts Gambling's Most Furtive (and Quirky) Fraternity cigaraficionado.com, Sept/Oct 1999
- ^Ian Kaplan (March 2004). 'review of Bringing Down the House'.
- ^ThePOGG (10 November 2012). 'ThePOGG Interviews – Semyon Dukach – MIT Card Counting team captain'.
- ^'ThePOGG Interviews – Nathaniel Tilton author of 'The Blackjack Life''. Retrieved 6 March 2013.
- ^The Last Casino on IMDb.Retrieved 2009-11-03.
Is 21 Blackjack A True Story Movie
External links[edit]
21 Blackjack Free
Retrieved from 'https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=MIT_Blackjack_Team&oldid=922990763'