Lucky Number Slevin

Lucky Number Slevin
Directed by	Paul McGuigan
Written by	Jason Smilovic
Starring	Josh Hartnett Bruce Willis Lucy Liu Morgan Freeman Ben Kingsley Stanley Tucci
Cinematography	Peter Sova
Edited by	Andrew Hulme
Music by	J. Ralph
Distributed by	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer The Weinstein Company
Release dates	February 24, 2006 (UK) April 7, 2006 (USA)
Running time	109 minutes
Language	English
Budget	27-30,000,000USD
Box office	56,308,881USD worldwide

Lucky Number Slevin (also known as Lucky # Slevin or The Wrong Man) is a 2006 crime thriller film written by Jason Smilovic, directed by Paul McGuigan and starring Josh Hartnett, Morgan Freeman, Ben Kingsley, Stanley Tucci, Lucy Liu and Bruce Willis set in New York plot focuses on the paths of Slevin Kelevra (Hartnett), Lindsey (Liu), two feuding mafia bosses known as The Boss (Freeman) and The Rabbi (Kingsley), and a mysterious Hitman known as Mr. Goodkat (Willis).

Plot

The film opens with the mysterious deaths of two men, the first shot in a parking garage, the second man killed behind his desk with a baseball. In both cases ledgers are stolen from their bodies and the face of the killer(s) is not shown.

Later, in the waiting area of an airport, a young, bearded man is approached by Bruce Willis's character, sitting alongside him in a wheelchair and retelling the story of a low-income family man who made a large bet with an off-track bookie based on a sure-thing tip he heard regarding a fixed horse race. The Mobsters financing the bookie were new in town and upon discovering the "fixed race," eliminated everyone involved, from horse to bookie to betters, as an object lesson to solidify their reputation. After concluding the story, Willis's character stands from his wheelchair and breaks the man's neck.

In the present day, a young Slevin Kelevra (Josh Hartnett) is staying in an apartment when he meets Lindsey (Lucy Liu), a neighbor across the corridor. Slevin relates to Lindsay a string of unfortunate events that has led Nick Fisher, the apartments owner, to invite him to stay in town. Slevin has just arrived, but says he hasn't seen his friend yet and is waiting for his return. Lindsey is concerned by Nick's absence and supposing he is in trouble, embarks on a mission to find out what has happened to him. She checks his phone and finds that his most recent calls all have something to do with a hotel telephone number.

Slevin is kidnapped by two henchmen who drag him to the office of The Boss (Morgan Freeman), a powerful Black mafia boss, who has mistaken Slevin for Nick and is looking to collect Nick's sizeable debt. Perhaps realizing that Slevin is not Nick, the Boss offers to forgive the debt if Slevin agrees to murder the son (The Fairy) of his rival and former partner Jewish mafia bossThe Rabbi (Ben Kingsley), in retaliation for the Rabbi authorizing the murder of the Boss's son. The Boss gives Slevin until the next morning to consider his options.

It is then revealed that The Boss has hired a hitman (Willis) to kill The Fairy, but has agreed to set up Nick Fisher to take the fall. The hitman will kill Nick (Slevin) to make it appear as a suicide pact of two gay lovers, avoiding the criminal war that would follow if The Rabbi believed The Boss was behind the death of his son.

Soon after Slevin returns to his apartment, he is taken by some henchmen to meet The Rabbi a Jewish mafia boss who resides in a penthouse directly opposite The Boss's own penthouse. The Rabbi, too, mistakes Slevin for Nick, and also wants Slevin to come up with a large sum of money to pay off a debt.

Slevin returns to the apartment, and tells Lindsey of his situation. Lindsey has also been her hotel phone number lead and taken a cell phone photo of the mysterious hitman who appears to be involved in Slevin's predicament. Lindsey observes that Slevin is inexplicably calm about the situation, to which Slevin replies that he has a condition known as ataraxia.

As Slevin reluctantly plans to murder The Fairy, he is bundled into an unmarked police van, mistaken for a new professional hit man by a detective Brikowski. The police know Slevin is not Nick, as Nick has a criminal record and his photo is on file. The Rabbi also suspects that Slevin is not Nick, but has no evidence to prove this. Meanwhile, Slevin and Lindsey become lovers.

Slevin sets up a date with The Fairy and kills him. This is a turning point in the film, as up to this point Slevin seems friendly and naive and not at all inclined to kill someone. The HItman, known as 'Goodkat' arrives and it becomes clear the two men are working together and Slevin is not who he appears to be. Fisher's body, which Goodkat has supplied, is planted at the scene with Slevin's unique wristwatch placed on its wrist. A bomb is then detonated, burning the bodies. The Boss is unhappy because the killing was supposed to be done in a way that made it look like an accident rather than a mob hit.

In the third act of the film, Slevin and Goodkat kill a number of bodyguards, kidnap The Boss and The Rabbi and tie them together. Slevin then explains who he is and the reason for his actions.

Slevin intentions were to get close to both The Rabbi and The Boss. They do this by first eliminating the bookies financed by the Rabbi and The Boss. At this point it is revealed that Goodkat was responsible for the death of the man in the parking garage at the beginning of the film, and Slevin is responsible for killing the second bookie with a baseball and his bodyguards with poison tipped darts. In both cases, Slevin retrieves their books and begins studying them extensively. Slevin then kills the son of The Boss (which provokes The Boss into bringing in Goodkat, the best Hitman he knows, to kill The Fairy). For this purpose, Slevin takes the identity of Nick Fisher, who owes a debt to both bosses' bookies. (Fisher is selected as he is a significant loser in both bookies' records.) Nick (the stranger in the airport at the beginning) is murdered by Goodkat, and the son of The Boss is killed by Slevin so that The Boss will hire Goodkat for revenge. Slevin pretends he was mugged and his wallet was stolen so he cannot be properly identified.

Slevins motivation is revenge for the 1979 horseracing incident related at the begining of the film. Slevin was the young boy who's family was killed, and The Boss and The Rabbi were the mobsters responsible. Goodkat was the killer hired to execute Slevin as a small boy, but instead he chose to keep the boy alive and raise him himself.

Finally, Slevin kills both of them in the same way they killed his father, by wrapping plastic bags over their heads and taping them closed, causing them to suffocate.

While in his car, Detective Brikowski gets a call from another officer who tells him what he has learned about the apparently related fixed horse race and the murders of those involved. The detective instinctively discovers during this time that Slevin is the boy who was supposed to have been murdered by Goodkat. The origin of Slevin's name is also revealed as the name of the race horse that died. The detective is then disclosed to viewers as having been the mob hitman who murdered Slevin's mother (it was the only way to clear his mob gambling debts). The officer also informs Detective Brikowski of the meaning of Slevin's last name i.e Kelevra, which is a Hebrew word, and before he could tell Brikowski its meaning, Slevin rises up from the backseat of the detective's car and says the meaning of the word, which was "Bad Dog" (the opposite of GoodKat) and executes him.

Lindsey wants to help Slevin, but because of her photo of Goodkat, Goodkat tells Slevin she must die. Slevin warns her, however, and has her wear body armor with a bag of blood over her heart to make it look like she has been killed. Goodkat shoots her while she's at work at the Coroner's Office, performing an autopsy.

In the final scene, Slevin and Lindsey meet at the airport when Goodkat arrives and tells Slevin that he understands Slevin's deception, because he had done essentially the exact same thing when he chose not to execute Slevin as a small boy and hands him his father's watch. They part amiably.

Cast

• Josh Hartnett — Slevin Kelevra/Henry
• Morgan Freeman — The Boss
• Ben Kingsley — The Rabbi
• Bruce Willis — Goodkat/Smith
• Lucy Liu — Lindsey
• Stanley Tucci — Detective Brikowski
• Sam Jaeger — Nick Fisher
• Rick Bramucci — Soldier
• Kevin Chamberlin — Marty
• Oliver Davis — Henry
• Victoria Fodor — Helen
• John Ghaly — Police Officer
• Janet Lane — Blondie
• Shira Leigh — Hottie
• Mykelti Williamson — Sloe
• Dorian Missick — Elvis
• Sebastien Roberts — Man
• Michael Rubenfeld — The Fairy
• Robert Forster — Murphy
• Corey Stoll — Saul
• Matthew G. Taylor — Man
• Danny Aiello — Roth

Awards and nominations

Directors Guild of Canada: Nominated: Outstanding Sound Editing - Feature Film Milan International Film Festival: Won: Best Film (Paul McGuigan) Won: Best Actor (Josh Hartnett) Motion Picture Sound Editors, USA: Nominated: Best Sound Editing for Music in a Feature Film Nominated: Best Sound Editing for Sound Effects and Foley in a Foreign Film

Trivia

• On promotional material for the film, Ben Kingsley's credit included his honorary title. At first, the actor was singled out for some criticism as such things are usually omitted from professional credits. It transpired that this was a mistake by a studio executive, who was unfamiliar with the conventions for titled actors.
• In an alternate ending found on the DVD, Slevin shoots Lindsey.
• Bruce Willis and Josh Hartnett were in another movie together, Sin City.
• The film's title in Australia is The Wrong Man. This is the title of a 1956 Hitchcock film in which the lead character has a case of mistaken identity, a theme which many Hitchcock films, and indeed this film, share. In fact, the main character's plight in North by Northwest is referenced by The Rabbi as being similar to Slevin's.
• The film shares many similarities with Akira Kurosawa's Yojimbo where a samurai plays two rival criminals against each other. Yojimbo was remade as Walter Hill's Last Man Standing which also stars Bruce Willis as a hit man named "Mr. Smith" in prohibition-era America.
• The name of the film comes from an episode of The New Shmoo. Shmoo is also referenced by Morgan Freeman in the movie.
• Nick Fisher was listed in the betting books as number 1729. This is known as the Hardy-Ramanujan Number, and may have been chosen because of its recognizability among people who study mathematics.
• One of the guns wielded by Goodkat (Bruce Willis) on the DVD cover and on promotional posters is a Springfield XD handgun which, ironically, never appears in the film.

See also

• Ataraxia
• Kansas City Shuffle

External links

• Official site
• Lucky Number Slevin at IMDb
• Lucky Number Slevin at Rotten Tomatoes
• Lucky Number Slevin at Box Office Mojo
• Watch: Red Carpet Premiere, NYC, on independentfilm.com