Lousy ‘Luck’ is jinxed right from the start

      From its generic title to its nepo baby star, the new Netflix weeper, “Don’t Say Good Luck,” is the epitome of bland, broad-brush filmmaking. Nothing about it is original or vital. Just a shoddily made gift from a dad to his not-so-talented daughter in an effort to provide her with a career built on nepotism instead of hard work.

      It’s a trend I’ve noticed far too often this year in which showbiz parents either write, direct, or produce projects for their teenage kids to star in at our expense. To be fair, this one is a lesser waste of time than, say, recent nepo fare such as “Their Town” or “She Dances,” but nowhere near as good as the sorely overlooked gem, “K-Pops!,” an extremely rare exception among this irksome fad.

      The too-proud papa here is Adam Sandler, who, along with his wife, Jackie, put up the dough to finance “Don’t Say Good Luck for their 17-year-old daughter, Sunny, who has been gifted bit parts in many of Dad’s mixed bag of pictures. Here, though, she’s front and center as Sophie Birenbaum, who in not much of a stretch, wants to become a star of musical theater.

     To that end, she’s just scored the lead in her high school’s production of “Waitress.” But as luck would have it, at almost the exact same time, her Moms (Melanie Lanskey) has been diagnosed with a fatal recurrence of cancer. Can the show go on? When a movie is as contrived and overly earnest as this one, you bet it can.

    True, it’s not Sunny Sandler’s fault that her dad picked such a dud script, written by Laura Hankin, Jordan Horowitz and the film’s director, Julia Hart, for maximum maudlin effect. But it is on her that she fails to be convincing in the role. Before you accuse me of picking on her because she’s Sandler’s daughter, know that during the entire time I was watching “Don’t Say Good Luck,” I had no idea of Sunny’s last name, nor did I recognize her from any of her father’s movies.

    Yet, not more than 15 minutes in, I commented to my wife that this girl has got to be a nepo baby because her singing is only a smidgen worse than her acting. And when the end credits rolled, my suspicions were confirmed, as was my lack of bias. But then, no one in this turkey excels. Not even Emmy winners Steve Buscemi and Bebe Neuwirth as Sophie’s grandparents, who come to live with the Birenbaum clan after Mom gets the bad news. True, they’re the best things here, but even they can’t begin to rescue it from the onrushing treacle.

     Much of that sap comes courtesy of Lynskey sleepwalking her way toward a paycheck as Sophie’s “brave,” selfless mother who will do anything for her daughter, including lying about how awful shape she’s in. She’s able to sell the fib because, unlike most cancer patients, she always looks perfectly healthy, with no loss of hair or weight – right up until the end. As a cancer patient myself, I kept saying to myself, I’ll have what she’s having. If only fighting it were that easy.

     But then the film’s three writers have no interest in realism. It’s all about the blubbering sadness that befalls the Birenbaums, including Sophie’s two little brothers and her feckless, bagel shop-owning dad (Max Greenfield), who seems more like a hunky accessory than a flesh-and-blood person. The only character with any heft is Sophie’s best friend, Carolyn, but that’s all due to the fine work provided by Scarlett Esteves, who I kept thinking would have made for a more ideal leading lady, largely because she’s the only teen here who knows how to act.

     Hart, whose most notable achievement is co-writing (with her husband, Horowitz) and directing the immortal “Hollywood Stargirl” for Disney Plus, makes sure to hit all the right beats along a predictable path in which Sophie does a lot of growing up by forgiving her mom for lying and her leading man on and off stage (Jack Champion) for being a sneaky cad. But then she and the latter had zero chemistry to start with, despite their annoying amount of kissy face.

     Even though I feel gross for even mentioning his name in association with this slop, Ernest Hemingway famously wrote that every true story ends in death. Well, this is one utterly fake one that suffers the exact same fate. But the particular demise is the worst kind – slow and sickeningly sweet. So, thanks, Mom and Dad – for nothing.

Movie review

Don’t Say Good Luck

Rated: PG-13

Cast: Sunny Sandler, Melanie Lynskey, Max Greenfield, Jack Champion, Steve Buscemi, Bebe Neuwirth and Scarlett Esteves

Director: Julia Hart

Writers: Laura Hankin, Julia Hart and Jordan Horowitz

Runtime: 91 minutes

Where: Premiering on Netflix on Aug. 14

Grade: C-