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Casino (1995) from Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski) |
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Martin Scorsese is generally considered to be the dean of American filmmakers, the man that the youngsters look up to. Scorsese's reputation is so redoubtable that most people are surprised to discover that he has never won an Oscar and has never had a hit. (Gangs of New York came the closest to box office success, with a $77 million gross, but that compared to a $97 million budget). I guess that means I feel about the same way everyone else feels about this guy - his talent is evident, but if he's so freakin' good, why can't he make a movie I actually like watching? One of the problems with Casino is that it is practically a sequel to Goodfellas. If you just couldn't get enough of Goodfellas, here it is again. Joe Pesci obviously couldn't get enough, because when his friend Scorsese called him up, he must have said "Marty, I need time to study the role. What's my character?", and Scorsese must have responded, "skip the heavy study, Li'l Joe, because you can play the EXACT same character as in Goodfellas." When I say "exact" here, I don't mean "kinda similar". I mean that this is the exact same guy with a different name. The first time Pesci did this, it was kind of a cool idea that a little, flabby, overweight dwarf with a sissy voice turns out to be an uncontrollable psychopathic juggernaut who destroys everyone in his path. I'm not really convinced, however, that every movie needs that character. Maybe you have a different idea. If you think Amadeus would be a better movie with a chubby little Salieri who kills Mozart by squeezing his head in a vice, Casino is your movie. Personally, I'm holding out for Joe Pesci's Hamlet. Casino is based on a famous gambler named Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal, whose story was told in Nicholas Pileggi's nonfiction book, Casino: Love and Honor in Las Vegas. Although Pileggi also co-wrote the Casino screenplay with Scorsese, the movie is a fictionalization which does not follow the Rosenthal story precisely. Here is the publicity blurb for the book:
That summary does not exactly apply to the movie, but it's close enough to give you the idea. Robert DeNiro plays the mastermind with quiet, icy elegance. Joe Pesci plays his boyhood friend who becomes a noted Vegas hoodlum. Sharon Stone plays the hooker who becomes DeNiro's wife, then Pesci's lover. The efficient DeNiro character, Ace, has everything under control on the casino side, but everything goes wrong in his personal life, and that eventually undermines his casino operation, which needs to stay low-key in order to be effective. Ace refuses to cut ties with his out-of-control pal, then he is betrayed by his chronically unfaithful and coke-addicted wife, then he hosts a local TV show which draws further attention to himself. Ideally, the mob bosses want Ace to operate quietly and discreetly in the shadows, and to give the impression that he's a faceless bureaucratic executive in the IBM or Disney mold, maintaining an aura of legitimacy which allows the mobs to quietly skim and launder money through the casinos. When Ace's life gets too flamboyant, the mob boys realize that Ace and his associates are exposing the operation to unwanted scrutiny, and ... Well, don't make them angry. You wouldn't like them when they're angry. You wouldn't even like them that much when they're in a good mood. It is often misreported that the movie is based on Pileggi's book. That is almost true, but not quite. The book was still a work in progress when Scorsese and Pileggi created the screenplay. Technically, the screenplay was actually written before the book, not after, but it was based on the book-in-progress. |
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Although the film is fictionalized, if you believe what the film tells you, you can assume that you won't receive much misleading information. In fact, the film plays out like a documentary at times, when it presents endless sidebars about the details of money laundering, casino scamming, gaming, cheating, protection rackets, greasing the local politicians, and more. The film must include more voice-over than any other major fictional film in history. It runs just about three hours, and there must be pretty close to ninety minutes of narration. My thoughts: a good movie, but not great. Too long, too much narration, too familiar, and too much detail about penny-ante aspects of bookmaking, casino operation, and Nevada politics. |
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Oh, well. If you're into the whole Scorsese, Goodfellas thing, this is a must-see for you. Excluding documentaries, Casino is rated fourth highest of all Scorsese's films at IMDb (see a list of the top dozen below), and the three above it are considered to be unchallenged masterpieces, so the general verdict of posterity seems to be "Casino is a near masterpiece". |
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