MIT student Ben Campbell is accepted into Harvard Medical School. He is interviewed as a potential candidate for the prestigious Robinson Scholarship, which will pay for all his school-related expenses. Despite boasting stats such as a 1590 SAT score, 44 MCAT score, and a 4.0 GPA at MIT, Ben is told that competition for the scholarship is very fierce. Ben is urged to write an essay which will make him "stand out"; in other words, an essay which will dazzle the recruiter.

During an advanced math class, Professor Micky Rosa challenges Campbell with a three door variable change problem, which Campbell solves successfully. Rosa invites Ben to join MIT's Blackjack Team led by Rosa, which consists of the young men Choi and Fisher and the young women Jill and Kianna. They specialize in playing with little money just to count cards and send secret signals (code words for the count, and hand signals for starting and stopping playing, etc.), and "big players", including Ben, who play with large amounts of money whenever this is mathematically expected to be profitable based on the counting. Campbell is reluctant, but eventually joins the team. After weeks of intensive training, Ben is given a test at an underground casino, which he passes.

The team goes to Las Vegas. Campbell's performance impresses Rosa, while provoking jealousy from teammate Fisher. Meanwhile, Ben forms a sexual relationship with Jill. One evening, a drunken Fisher sits at Ben's table. Fisher starts talking about the "retard" in Rain Man. He then causes a fight by spilling a drink on the table, which escalates into gunshots being fired. Rosa then kicks Fisher off the team and sends him home. All the while, security chief Cole Williams monitors the blackjack team, particularly Ben.

Back at MIT, Ben accidentally botches his group project (by giving his friend Miles the incorrect microchip) for the 2.09 competition. His teammates angrily dismiss him from the project. All of this provokes a severe inner conflict during Ben's next trip to Vegas. He winds up losing all the money he had that night. An exasperated Rosa goes home, promising that Ben will reimburse him for the entire loss. Ben and his three teammates bankroll the rest of their money. They go to the Riviera. Williams finds Ben and beats him up, then lets him go with a dire warning.

Ben returns to MIT, only to find his dorm room ransacked; even worse, the blackjack winnings he had hidden in the ceiling have been taken. Ben suspects that Rosa is behind it, but cannot prove anything, so he makes an offer: he'll win back the money he lost, before biometric software takes over at casinos. Rosa takes him up on it. Disguised, Ben and the rest of Micky's Blackjack Team go back to the Planet Hollywood. They rake in over $640,000 before Williams finds them again and gives chase. The team members rapidly bag their chips, then split up and flee through the casino. During the chase, Ben switches bags with teammate Jill Taylor, and then with Rosa.

Rosa gives Williams the slip by ducking into a limousine just before it leaves, only to find that the bags were switched and the driver is the casino manager. It turns out that Williams, who has been trying to catch Rosa for over a decade, made a deal with Ben, promising to allow him to "make a killing" in return for Rosa. Williams betrays this deal by forcing Ben to give up his chips at gunpoint. However, he thanks Ben for this by forcing Rosa to give back the money he stole from Ben and give Ben at least a 4.0 at graduation.

Ben closes his story with the following summation: throughout his life, he won a fortune twice and it was stolen both times. Sure enough, the recruiter is dazzled.

21 received generally negative to mixed reviews from critics. As of April 2, 2008, the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 32% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 107 reviews. Metacritic reported the film had an average score of 48 out of 100, based on 28 reviews.

In its opening weekend, the film grossed $24.105m US $ in 2,648 theaters in the United States and Canada, averaging $9,103 per venue and ranking #1 at the box office.The film was also the #1 film in its second weekend of release, losing just 36% of its audience, grossing $15,337,418, expanding to 2,653 theaters, and averaging $5,781 per venue. The film dropped to #3 in its third weekend, losing only 32% of its audience, grossing $10,470,173, expanding to 2,736 theaters, and averaging $3,827 per venue. It fell to #6 in its fourth weekend, losing 47% of its audience, grossing $5,520,362 expanding to 2,903 theaters and averaging $1,902 per venue.

As of May 31, 2008, it has grossed a total of $130,433,929 worldwide — $81,159,365 in the United States and Canada and $49,274,564 in other territories.

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