Lottery Ticket

A youth in the projects (Bow Wow) wins a $370 million lotto jackpot, but he can’t turn in the winning ticket until after the long Fourth of July weekend; meanwhile he has to deal with the neighborhood rumor mill and some major badass characters. Bow Wow and some other decent actors (Brandon T. Jackson, Naturi Naughton, Loretta Devine, Keith David) are set adrift in a script (by Abdul Williams) that only rarely rises to the level of junk, with a director (Erik White) so inept that he can’t even match one shot to the next. Then just when the movie is looking like a hopeless waste of time, a surprise: Ice Cube turns up as a washed-up, never-was boxer, in a performance of such depth and dimension that it takes your breath away. It’s Oscar-caliber work, showing up the surrounding movie for the garbage it is.