'Wild Card' - Movie Review

Looking for a brainless action movie on Netflix, I landed on this movie. I mean, it's got the ever-reliable Jason Statham, right? I got plenty of "brainless," not much action, and a weak and badly misguided attempt to discuss gambling addiction.

Jason Statham is Nick Wild, a skilled fighter who takes odd jobs around Las Vegas, mostly chaperoning gamblers who want protection. His latest client (Michael Angarano) is a bit of a dweeb and an old friend of his (Dominik Garcia-Lorido) has been raped by some nasties. Helping her inevitably leads to escalating problems, as we also find out that Nick is a gambling addict (unusually, he's not in debt to anyone - but any money he earns, he loses).

They hired a lot of good staffing for this one, and then wasted them. Sofía Vergara appears in only one scene, as a bimbo - don't condemn me for my terminology until you hear she's listed as "DD" in the credits. Stanley Tucci is good, but not around for long - but while he is he smoothly out-acts and embarrasses everyone on screen with him. Wild's string of luck at the tables is incredibly improbable, although the end of that run is inevitable (and boring). Michael Angarano's character is incredibly annoying - he's meant to be, but it's still ... annoying. Milo Ventimiglia's character is one-note macho evil, not interesting at all. Anne Heche, Jason Alexander, and Hope Davis are all good and experienced actors, wasted (along with Tucci) in relatively small and undemanding roles in this low grade tripe.

Wikipedia says "... Jason Statham developed the project himself ..." Was this an attempt to be seen as a serious actor? If so, it was exceptionally ill-conceived as the scenes where he has to act are significantly worse than his acting in a number of other movies.