/ Editor / 28 March 2008 /

IT was a time of heroes.

OK, not heroes exactly, more six MIT students who "were trained to become experts in card counting and subsequently took Vegas casinos for millions in winnings".

That's what it says on the tin. But is the film 21 really as it is billed?

The Las Vegas Sun recalls the comedy programme "Mr. Show with Bob and David" and an episode that skewered the way Hollywood "adopts" true stories to make them look so utterly unbelievable.

The paper takes a look at a movie entitled "Why Me? The Bob Lamonta Story" in which the eponymous hero Bob Lamonta is profiled. Mr Lamonta was raised by mentally challenged parents and won three Olympic gold medals before dying young.

Lamonta says the movie was all true, only his parents were not mentally challenged, he never competed in the Olympics, and he's still alive.

So to 21, the blackjack film starring Kevin Spacey, Kate Bosworth and Laurence Fishburne.

And Dave Irvine and Mike Aponte, who played Las Vegas with the MIT team in the 1990s, quite like it.

"I thought it was very good," says Irvine. "I thought it captured the scene pretty well. It did a good job capturing the lifestyle of these kids, who were typical students during the week, and how they had to adjust to becoming Vegas high rollers on the weekend.

"I didn't know what to expect going in, but I felt pleasantly surprised. Maybe that means I had low expectations going in, I don't know. I was entertained, that's for sure."

What of Aponte? Says he: "Well, it was interesting. I knew beforehand it was a movie version and that it was only 'inspired by' these true stories. I kind of had mixed feelings about it. Overall, I'd say they did an exciting Hollywood version of the story.

"Obviously it's not going to capture the real, true story. It's not going to tell you exactly what happened, and I don't think that's the intent."

In the real world, Irvine and Aponte are promoting an Internet-based card-counting training system called BlackjackVT.

"It's not just teaching, but giving people the ability to progress and learn new skills one by one," says Aponte. "That's the thing with card counting: It's a pretty straightforward system, but the big key is practicing enough to get good at it."

Counting cards is dull. Watching a film about someone counting cards could be more entertaining than Coronation Street but may lack enough live action and guns to keep audiences enthralled.

Better to keep your money and if you are interested in winning at cards, keep practicing...

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