You would have thought that this biographical film about Stu Unger (one of the greatest card players ever) had great dramatic potential, but this movie turns out to be a most undramatic undertaking. The plot device is to have Unger sit on a bed in some fleabag motel room and tell his story to a "mysterious stranger." The story is told in linear flashbacks inter-cut with *much* talk in the motel room. I always get suspicious when a screenwriter has a character talk about himself rather than being able to formulate a scene to more effectively make the point, or at least have the character talking within the context of a scene rather than talking about a scene.
This is a movie about a person and his profession. We get a lot of stuff about the person - teased kid, difficult father, marriage, child, divorce, drugs - but not much about the profession. As presented this is the life's arc of a not atypical contemporary American and it is not all that interesting. The focus should not be on why this guy was ordinary but rather why he was extraordinary. This is like offering a biography of Einstein but never drawing us in with an understanding of his professional accomplishments and his genius.
Many opportunities are missed to provide some excitement, tension, and interest. At least some intense build-up should have been given to Unger's winning his first World Series of Poker, climaxed with his going head-to-head with poker legend Doyle Brunson. That scene was disappointingly uninspired. My god, how could they flub that so badly?
A political party will play to its base and why this movie failed so miserably to play to its base of poker players is a mystery. Maybe it did not want to glorify gambling, and it does not, but using Unger as a poster boy for the evils of gambling is misguided - he was such an unusual person that drawing any general conclusions is questionable. In any case most drug addicts will not fare well at the tables and the fact that Unger could come back to win the WSOP in 1997 is an amazing feat. It has always puzzled me why passionate professional gamblers are considered addicts and cast in a negative light, but those who pursue other professions to the exclusion of most all else are accorded esteem.
Some have honored this film for not sugarcoating Ungar's slide toward addiction and death. But from reading about Ungar's life it sounds like his womanizing, surly behavior, and drug use were much worse than portrayed. In fact I got more from reading the wikipedia entry on Ungar than I did from this film, so go there if you want to save yourself some time.
Never having seen "The Sopranos" I had never seen any of these actors before and my reaction was, "not bad, but not great."
If you want to see a much more perceptive character study of a gambler, see Philip Seymore Hoffman in the under-appreciated "Owning Mahoney."
This is a movie about a person and his profession. We get a lot of stuff about the person - teased kid, difficult father, marriage, child, divorce, drugs - but not much about the profession. As presented this is the life's arc of a not atypical contemporary American and it is not all that interesting. The focus should not be on why this guy was ordinary but rather why he was extraordinary. This is like offering a biography of Einstein but never drawing us in with an understanding of his professional accomplishments and his genius.
Many opportunities are missed to provide some excitement, tension, and interest. At least some intense build-up should have been given to Unger's winning his first World Series of Poker, climaxed with his going head-to-head with poker legend Doyle Brunson. That scene was disappointingly uninspired. My god, how could they flub that so badly?
A political party will play to its base and why this movie failed so miserably to play to its base of poker players is a mystery. Maybe it did not want to glorify gambling, and it does not, but using Unger as a poster boy for the evils of gambling is misguided - he was such an unusual person that drawing any general conclusions is questionable. In any case most drug addicts will not fare well at the tables and the fact that Unger could come back to win the WSOP in 1997 is an amazing feat. It has always puzzled me why passionate professional gamblers are considered addicts and cast in a negative light, but those who pursue other professions to the exclusion of most all else are accorded esteem.
Some have honored this film for not sugarcoating Ungar's slide toward addiction and death. But from reading about Ungar's life it sounds like his womanizing, surly behavior, and drug use were much worse than portrayed. In fact I got more from reading the wikipedia entry on Ungar than I did from this film, so go there if you want to save yourself some time.
Never having seen "The Sopranos" I had never seen any of these actors before and my reaction was, "not bad, but not great."
If you want to see a much more perceptive character study of a gambler, see Philip Seymore Hoffman in the under-appreciated "Owning Mahoney."