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List Price: $9.98 | | Label: MGM (Video & DVD)
Salesrank: 31359
Released: June 15, 1999 |
| Our Price: $0.99 |
| Used Price: $0.01 |
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Gary Starke can get his hands on just about anything: floor level seats at a Knicks game, entrance to an exclusive art gallery or first-row concert tickets. But the one thing Gary can't seem to get is the girl of his dreams. Join OscarÂ(r) nominee* Andy Garcia and the lovely Andie MacDowellas they gamble against the odds in the game of love in this wonderfully funny romantic comedy. Longtime New York con man Gary (Garcia) is a king among scam artists but a loser in life. The only thing he has going for him is Linda (MacDowell), a stunning chef-in-the-making with a soft spot for underdogs. But even Linda isn't a sure thing when she's accepted into a Parisian cooking school,and decides it's time to leave the city and Gary! Now this streetwise hustler must pull out all the stops and turn on all the charm if he ever hopes to win his way back into her heart!
Description of Just the Ticket:
Gary Starke (Andy Garcia) is New York City's supreme scalper. Tickets for the Knicks, MOMA, the pope--you name it, he can get it. To mainstream society, however, Gary doesn't exist. He doesn't work 9 to 5, he doesn't have either a driver's license or a Social Security number, and he isn't even sure he was born in a hospital. Just the Ticket, Richard Wenk's wonderfully understated, well written and ultimately touching romantic comedy, is the story of how Gary finally finds identity. The movie's central premise has Gary trying to score big by scalping tickets for the pope's New York City appearance in order to win back his ex-girlfriend (Andie MacDowell). Both MacDowell and Garcia have been mired in career ruts, so their sexual chemistry is Just the Ticket's biggest surprise. Wenk knows and loves these characters (he based the protagonist on a scalper he met 20 years ago, and he spent five more years pitching the script to numerous studios), and that warmth provides an energy that's so often missing in many Hollywood romantic comedies. Also engaging (and at times heartbreaking) is Richard Bradford, who plays an aging runner who serves as Gary's father figure. MGM inexplicably dumped this picture in the dead of winter in 1999. The DVD--which features audio commentary by Garcia and Wenk, deleted scenes, and a four-page booklet about the making of the film--gives the film the second chance it deserves. --Dave McCoy
Just the Ticket Reviews:
Personal lives, in chaos. of the US's newcomers, set in NYC 
2007-03-25 - JUST THE TICKET, is definitely not a waste of cash as a movie
rental, although it's debatable whether the audience will enjoy
being taken on the highs and lows that this story tells, of a
ticket scalper (black market ticket reseller.) It does work
well, as a rental.
The story is a homage in part, to the illegal alien population
of the USA that numbers in the 10 to 20 million, who have no ID
papers, having been born outside the country or in
circumstances that didn't allow them to get papers. As such,
they have to hustle in jobs offering little or no job security,
such as reselling services on the streets, in a cat and mouse
game with law enforcement, and this affects their personal
lives, that often are in chaos.
Starring Andy Garcia, who is present in almost every frame of
this film, and bears a tremendous responsibility in carrying the
film's entertainment value, and Andie MacDowell who plays the
undecided girlfriend (but who is not to be underestimated as an
actress) the picture entertains from beginning to end, with some
tasteful music and interesting shots of NYC streets.
It also brings to light some aspects of mid-life crisis that
some humans feel, when they realize they haven't met all their
life dreams, goals and aspirations that they had set for
themselves in a prescribed period of time.
It also tells of the struggle, commercially, that merchants and
hustlers face from new competitors, who on occasion manage to
pay bribes to certain urban police officers to cover their
protection rackets and black market operations to get the upper
hand. A 2.5 for this movie, almost a 3, considering many will
find it too depressing for the theater or to be watched more
than once.
Andy Garcia is THE MAN! 
2004-03-27 - I rented this movie and after watching it, I knew I had to own it. Andy Garcia is so charming in this (as well as drop dead gorgeous) - it's too bad he isn't offered more comedy roles. He was great in this as was the rest of the cast. I really enjoyed the storyline. And those eyes - ouch! I hope his wife appreciates what she gets to wake up next to every day.
Surprisingly well done.
2003-12-31 - Andy Garcia completely owns the screen in every scene. His performance here is enough for anyone to buy this movie. But, alas, there are problems with his supporting actress Andie Macdowell. The whole movie she looks like a deer caught in high-beam headlights. It is particularly noticeable whenever she "shares" a scene with Mr. Garcia. There is one scene where it's her big moment, her "look at me and see how talented an actress I am" moment, when Andy Garcia completely downplays the scene and through subtlety and nuance buries Mrs. Macdowell and steals the movie from under her. Another scene, a pre-love-making stare-down between the two stars is almost laughable. Andie Macdowell is frozen while Andy Garcia nearly melts the celluloid with his eyes. It's as if Mrs. Macdowell realized at some point that she was just no match for Mr. Garcia, went limp, and planned her follow-up project. She has talent, just not in this movie. Try "Dinner with Friends" to see what she's really capable of. All said, this movie would have been better off without a love-interest sub-plot. The lives of the myriad professional scalpers was more than enough to keep me watching. The seedy underworld they inhabit while just trying to make a living was very interesting. Overall, this was a surprising and mostly rewarding film.
Andy & Andie: Two Stars Really Shine... and That's All About 
2002-03-04 - Our editorial review tells me that "Just the Ticket" was dumped into theater in the winter of 1999; well, Japanese release was much worse. It never received a theatrical release, going straight to video, and worse still, we had to wait until February of 2002! Does this lukewarm reception mean two stars' recent career decline? Whatever the reason may be, "Just the Ticket" is not as bad as those cold reaction suggests.
The best part of the film is, surprise! the two leading stars. Andy Garcia is well-cast as a ticket scalper with cute "puppy's eyes" while Andie MacDowell succeeds in exuding enough sexual chemistry to convince you that they were, and are going to be, lovers. Whenever those two likable actors share the screen, the film sparks with fire ... in the bedroom, in the kitchen, and wherever they are. I don't know how many faithful fans are watching this, but they deserve a chance to play a big role (no more "Town and Country" for Andie, please) in the film again.
Negative impressions of this romantic comedy come from, I think, two following reasons: supporting players and overlong script. Except for the good performance of Richard Bradford's Benny, who is clearly playing a losing game in front of powerful newcomers, none is memorable. And the film's tone is very uneven; it sometimes takes itself too seriously to be philosophical, but at other places it resorts to incredibly silly things -- see Andy Garcia disguised as ... a nun, for instance. No wonder the studio could not be confident in its release.
As a whole decent romantic comedy, "Just the Ticket" manages to deliver what movie fans who love this genre want to see. And the dog is cute, too. We have no fresh insider look on the world of ticket scalpers, nothing new as a romantic comedy, but two leads are so good that it is hardly possible for me to nag, though maybe I should.
Just a cute movie...
2001-08-06 - Nothing heavy here! This is one movie I enjoyed with Andy in because he does show a comedic side to himself. He is actually quite good in this and Andie Mcdowell is just as cute as she can be. This is a chick flick, especially if you are an Andy fan. A light romantic comedy with a sprinkle a seriousness thrown in for good measure.
