Francesca Rudkin: Jay Kelly and Beat the Lotto

Jay Kelly  

Famous movie star Jay Kelly and his devoted manager, Ron, embark on an unexpectedly profound journey through Europe. Along the way, both men confront the choices they've made, relationships with loved ones, and the legacies they'll leave behind. 

 

Beat the Lotto  

Almost everyone has played the Lottery and everyone would like to win it. Whitaker's documentary tells the story of Stefan, the man who tried to beat the Lotto system by attempting to fix the draw, an act that divided the nation. 

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Team podcast
from News Talks A B.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
It's the most beautiful some of them lights, further street spreading,
so much to plash play in the winter, snow under.

Speaker 3 (00:23):
The mission, So twenty two minutes to ten nine News
Talks d B. Yes, your Spotify algorithm is probably feeding
you a whole lot of this sort of stuff at
the moment. Your Netflix algorithm, your TV and z Plus
algorithm probably doing the same thing. All the Christmas movies
every week. Time to get your film pics for this week, though,
And Francesca Rudkin, our movie reviewer.

Speaker 4 (00:44):
Is here a good morning, good morning.

Speaker 3 (00:47):
Are you into the Christmas films? Is that your sort
of thing? I can't.

Speaker 4 (00:51):
I can't do them.

Speaker 3 (00:52):
Yeah, I look know that.

Speaker 4 (00:54):
Yeah, look I might, but I've got quite a lot
of other really good stuff to watch at the moment,
because we're heading into Oscar Territory January with there's all
these amazing films being released and I'm in the process
of watching all lows at the moment, and I can't
watch the same Christmas film year after year after year
after year. And then swimming Services is just filled with nonsense.

Speaker 3 (01:13):
Well, they sort of worked out, haven't they that there
is a market for the ridiculous, like low budget totally
silly leads them through itself.

Speaker 4 (01:20):
If you love them, go for it. I have a
friend who starts at the end of November and every
night her and her family watch a Christmas movie.

Speaker 3 (01:26):
Wow, she loves them, So go for it.

Speaker 4 (01:28):
That's what thing.

Speaker 3 (01:28):
Go for it, all right, Two non Christmasy films for
us this morning, and let's begin with Jay Kelly, Jay.

Speaker 1 (01:34):
Kelly, so handsome, the last of the old movies.

Speaker 4 (01:37):
I'm down here.

Speaker 3 (01:40):
Sand I'm believing out a Saturday for Paris.

Speaker 4 (01:42):
This is your last summer. It would be so lonely
here without you.

Speaker 3 (01:46):
No, You're never alone.

Speaker 4 (01:47):
Really, I think I'm always alone.

Speaker 3 (01:50):
Thanks one, all right. George Clooney and Adam Sandler seeing
me up on this one.

Speaker 4 (01:55):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So this is Noah Bomback and Emily
Moolmer have written this film. Noah also directs. He's good
to Gourberg's partner. They wrote Barbie and Things. Emily has
a small role in the film with Well, but George
Clooney stars and he is pretty much playing himself. He's
an A list star. He's had a remarkable career, and

(02:15):
in this film, he takes a moment to reflect on
that career and his life and the fact that you
know what it took to make it, but then just
not even make it stay there as well. And what
he realizes is that, yes, that's been a huge success
and he's done very well, but he's kind of lost
everything else in his life along the way. He has

(02:37):
sort of nothing solid left in his personal life. He's
quite a hollowed out man, and he had He's got
a couple of daughters who are now sort of adults.
One is about to head off to college. And that's
what kind of the empty nest is what kind of
instigates this this self reflection. He always thought he wanted

(02:59):
to be a good parent. He thought he could postpone
his parenting a bit though, because he was always away
on films, making films and things. And when it comes
round to him going, I really want to reconnect with
my two daughters, unfortunately, he realizes that they don't need
him anymore and they don't necessarily have the time for
him and things. Adam Sandler plays his manager, and in
a sense, he is a very similar character in the

(03:21):
sense that he is also realizing that he has given
up his life and sacrificing time with his family all
to cater to the whims of one man, his client, Jay.
So the two of them are kind of in the
same boat. And then it's kind of an insider you know,
in sort of a Hollywood insider film, whereby it's that
question if your manager has been with you and help

(03:41):
you get to where you want to go for twenty
five years, are you friends or do you have a
working relationship because you take fifteen percent of their income?
Where where do the lines lie? So?

Speaker 3 (03:49):
Look, this is great.

Speaker 4 (03:50):
Both Adam Sandler and George Clooney are very good in
this film. It's beautifully shot. This is a nice little
distraction on Netflix.

Speaker 3 (03:57):
Yeah nice, Okay, cool. So that is Jay Kelly. Next
up is a film showing in cinemas. It's a documentary.
This has Beat the Lotto.

Speaker 1 (04:06):
You have the man who is the author of this book,
which is called Win the Lot of You're in the
syndicate yourself, aren't you? Yes?

Speaker 3 (04:14):
Indeed?

Speaker 4 (04:14):
And how many times did you win the jackpot? Well,
we haven't won the jackpipes. Do you want anything yet? No,
let's just say down in cork.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
Everything is possible, and of course.

Speaker 3 (04:26):
The rest is history. All right, let's beat the lotto, okay.

Speaker 4 (04:29):
So this is a rather crazy documentary that tells the
far fetch story of a syndicate who tried to take
on the establishment and Game Island's national lottery in nineteen
ninety two. So when their lotto began, it's a bit
like us here in New Zealand. Yet it's always pitched
as anyone could win. It's the dream, right, It's this
big dream, anyone could win it and things, and a

(04:51):
small time accountant he comes up with this idea that
he worked out it would cost just under one million
dollars to buy a ticket for every possible combination of
the six numbers in the lotto game. It was a
legal plan, perfectly legal, but it would only work if
they managed to get all the tickets they needed. And
so he convinced this group of entrepreneurs and professional gamblers
to get on board. And it took them ten months

(05:11):
and eleven million ticks to fill out all the lotto slips,
you know, to tack all the slips. And then they
sent all these people off around the countryside to try
and with these wands of tickets to buy the actual
larer tickets and things, and so the lottery then go oh,
someone's trying to gain the system and they're on it.
They're like, this is unfair, so they try and they
shut down terminals in the base. Oh and anyway, it's

(05:32):
all about it's a really clever plan, but had they
thought it through thoroughly? The mass was good, but was
the execution perfect? And this is where the fun begins.
So this is a film by Ross Whitaker, and it's
filled with a lot of the characters who were part
of this elaborate scam, as well as journalists who covered
the story and things, and it just takes you back
to be very much a particular time and place. And

(05:53):
it also made me sort of reminisce about our lotto
and sort of how we feel about it as well.

Speaker 3 (05:57):
It's a good fun Oh nice, Okay, cool. So that's
Beat the Lotto. That's a documentary's showing in cinemas at
the moment. Francisca's first film, Jay Kelly, is the one
with George Clooney Adam Sandler that is screening on Netflix,
and both of those films will of course be on
the news Talk's EDB website

Speaker 1 (06:12):
For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame, Listen live
to News Talks EDB from nine am Saturday, or follow
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