Uneven but interesting drama documenting the anger, frustration, and self-destruction of a gambler. Caan is good as a college professor so deeply in debt to his bookies that he must borrow money from his mother, Brookes, in order to keep Sorvino from killing him. Caan runs off to Las Vegas
with girlfriend Hutton and wins a bundle at the tables, but his desire to lose is so strong that he squanders it all on dumb sports bets. (One of the flaws of the film is that writer Toback says that all gamblers want to lose, an oversimplified analysis of a complex problem.) We now see that we
are in the presence of what George C. Scott called Paul Newman in THE HUSTLER (1961), ...
Released:
1974
Rated:
R
Length:
109 mins