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Jackpot! is an action comedy where we’re told The California Grand Lottery started during The Great Depression of 2026, leading everyone to be obsessed with it, because the prize amount can be worth billions.
However, if you’re the winner of the day, your problems are only just beginning, because if someone kills you before sundown, they’ll legally take your jackpot. The only rule is no guns or bullets can be used in the takedown.
The film is set in Los Angeles, 2030, where we initially see what can happen to a particular winner if they don’t make it out of the day alive, but life sucks for aspiring actress Katie Kim (Awkwafina – IF), especially when she rents an Air BNB room from Shadi (Ayden Mayeri), and finds out too late that there’s a leak in the ceiling… not water, but it’s sewage from the flat upstairs, and it’s leaking onto all her clothes… and she has an important audition.
But fame and fortune can come when you least expect it, and for her, she’s the next jackpot winner, with $3.6bn in the bag… as long as she can survive.
Before long – although for her, it feels like forever, because everyone’s been trying to kill her for a little while – she’s intercepted by Noel (John Cena – Ricky Stanicky), who’ll protect her until sundown for 10% of her winnings, since that’s his job. If she dies in the meantime, he’ll get nothing, so it’s in his interests to keep her safe. Of course, he could just kill her, himself, and scoop the lot, but then he’s not a dick.
Jackpot! is an insanely daft film, but it’s very entertaining when all the action kicks off, making this like Death Race 2000, but more like a chase rather than a race. It also features quite a lot of dialogue, which leads to a lot of humour, albeit not laugh-out-loud type. Still, i recommend putting the subtitles on to catch it all.
Cena does a brilliant job of sending himself up – especially as being the only grown man who regularly listens to the ‘Turtle Power’ theme from the 1990 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film, and as Katie wants him to help her escape the city, accidental insults won’t help such as, “How come someone whose face looks like a giant ear, not hear what I’m saying?!”
And of her Air BNB host and fellow actress, Shadi, “I’m great at improv. I just need time to prepare!”
But there’s scores of lines of great dialogue in this. However, it does slow down a fair bit in the third act. They could’ve cut out about 15 minutes and kept it to a tighter 80 minutes plus credits.
There’s no plot spoilers in what comes next, but it’s a brief summary of what comes during the credits and a post-credits scene:
Thanks to our friends at Prime Video for the screener prior to release.
Jackpot is on Prime Video from tomorrow, but the film isn’t yet available to pre-order on Blu-ray or DVD.
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 104 minutes
Release date: August 15th 2024
Studio: Prime Video
Aspect Ratio: 2.00:1
Rating: 7.5/10
Director: Paul Feig
Producers: Paul Feig, Laura Fischer, Jeff Kirschenbaum, Joe Roth
Screenplay: Rob Yescombe
Music: Theodore Shapiro
Cast:
Katie Kim: Awkwafina
Noel: John Cena
Shadi: Ayden Mayeri
DJ Donald: Elise Watkins
Sweet Irene: Becky Ann Baker
Louis Lewis: Simu Liu
Johnny Grand: Murray Hill
Rugged Man: Seann William Scott
Grandma Tala: Dolly De Leon
Earl the Fameland Guard: Leslie David Baker
Machine Gun Kelly: Colson Baker
Isabella: Imani Love
Himself: Bobby Lee
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.