Written by James M. Tate / 12/11/2011 / No comments / gangster , joe pesci , martin scorsese , melodrama , mob , nineties , robert deniro , sharon stone
A NEGATIVE REVIEW OF THE OVERLONG/OVERRATED 'CASINO'
year: 1995 rating: **1/2 |
But then something happens, or stops happening, or both: The main character, Sam "Ace" Rothstein, played by Robert De Niro, is a man of mind, not action. He’s to gambling what Scorsese is to directing… a natural… and the casino itself becomes an absorbing character: we feel the pulse of the machines, and the men behind the scenes, keeping the moneymaking beast alive while protecting it from cheaters, con artists, and crooked politicians.
Poster too good for the movie, fella |
The movie hits a wall with this escalating-downhill relationship between Sam and Ginger, but it was faltering beforehand – De Niro, Pesci, and some of the other shady characters, although colorful and formidable, aren’t interesting enough to really care about – unlike GOODFELLAS, RAGING BULL or TAXI DRIVER, they all seem more written than real. But the duel-narration here... while beautiful in GOODFELLAS between Ray Liotta and Lorraine Bracco... works here and it doesn’t: De Niro’s by-the-numbers account is fine in the beginning, giving us a firsthand account of how things run, but it becomes a rambling safety net for the lack of a streamlined plot: especially when his business luck turns sour.
Another fan poster, or something |
Then the last half runs itself completely ragged: juggling the dull doomed love story straight out of a nighttime soap, and Ace and Nicky's edgy friendship that meanders to a predictably violent conclusion (and they never seemed that tight to begin with for the eventual unraveling to really matter).
If Scorsese and scriptwriter Nicholas Pillegi stuck closer to the Casino, perhaps CASINO, and its characters, might have had more purpose. What we’re left with is too much style without substance. (And has there ever been a character more deserving a bloody death than James Wood's pimp/hustler who not only repeatedly steals Stone from DeNiro, but kidnaps, and continually threatens, his daughter? While we witness the immense, overboard bloodshed of everyone else, James comes out with a few bruises. What the hell were they thinking?!)
Labels:
gangster,
joe pesci,
martin scorsese,
melodrama,
mob,
nineties,
robert deniro,
sharon stone
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