Middling lucky

By Noel Vera

In Wayne Kramer's "The Cooler" (a 2003 movie for some reason being
released in Manila only now) the eponymous character not only has
consistent bad luck, but is able to spread that luck around him,
like a social disease. It's the kind of superstition you would only
find in the old Vegas; the new Vegas is too high-tech, too concerned
with balance sheets and the appearance of theme-park wholesomeness
to subscribe to such foolishness.

William Macy isn't just the lead; he's the main reason to actually
watch this picture. Macy's done sad-sack characters before, most
memorably as the put-upon car salesman in the Coen Brothers'
1996 "Fargo," and as the porn star's cuckolded husband in Paul
Thomas Anderson's 1997 "Boogie Nights," but I think his Bernie Lootz
is about as far as this persona can go without falling into cheap
caricature. With his downward sloping eyes and rubbery lips and
expression of constant disappointment, he radiates misfortune in
waves, affecting players and tables as he passes.

Much of the movie concerns Bernie's meeting Natalie (Maria Bello),
acting gallant to her, going to bed with her, later falling in love
with her, but the most intriguing relationship in the film isn't
between Bernie and Natalie, but between Bernie and casino boss
Shelley Kaplow (Alec Baldwin), the last of the old-style casino
bosses. Bernie and Shelley have been friends since both of them were
working the streets; one of Bernie's more entertaining stories told
to Natalie is how the term "easy mark" began (it was Bernie's job to
pat a man on the back, leaving a chalk mark, and Shelley's job to
follow and pick their pockets). The story implies that the two men
have been friends for a very long time, back when present-day slang
was still being minted, and that the two men's fortunes have taken
diametrically different directions.

Actually, I'd believe in the story more if I hadn't seen that exact
same device being used to mark Peter Lorre in Fritz Lang's great
1931 noir thriller "M," but that's one of the more endearing
characteristics of the script, and of Shelley (who I'm guessing saw
Lang's film and suggested it to Bernie)--for a gangster he seems
remarkably film literate. He also mentions Frank Capra's 1937 "Lost
Horizon" (whose city Shangri-La gives his casino its name) and
invokes James Stewart when Lootz delivers his big speech about
friendship and morality. But Baldwin is good enough that he cuts
through much of the treacly nostalgia; for every scene when he
mourns the old Vegas of gangsters and showgirls and expensive
prostitutes, there's a scene where he just has to look at someone
and you can feel the air blistering about them.

Baldwin's always been good at playing sleek predators, and his
Shelley, while not perhaps as eloquently menacing as, say, his
corporate shark in James Foley's 1992 adaptation of David Mamet's
play "Glengarry Glen Ross," or as quirky as his sociopath con man in
George Armitage's 1990 "Miami Blues," is still quite memorable. His
contempt for Lootz is easy to see; what makes the relationship
between the two so intriguing is the later suggestion that Shelley
is somehow dependent on Bernie as well--as a kind of benchmark
against which he can compare his own life, and as an old
acquaintance whose regard he nevertheless values, after all is said
and done.

Maria Bello's played whore with a heart of gold before--see Brian
Helgeland's "Payback" (1999), opposite a dimwitted Mel Gibson--and
would only be able to do something on an altogether different level
in David Cronenberg's 2005 "A History of Violence," but even a
cliché played by Bello is a fascinatingly watchable cliché--she's
not only got a drop-dead gorgeous body but also a face and
expression that suggests she's seen it all, done it all, screwed it
all (it's not so much age lines--she's got fewer than most women her
age--as it is the suggestion of utter exhaustion about her).

If the actors and their performances are the picture's strongest
hand, its weakest may be the script, by Kramer and fellow newcomer
Frank Hannah. The idea is interesting enough but the whole thing
feels like a footnote compared to Martin Scorsese's encyclopedic
1995 epic "Casino," where the violence is more intense (vices and
bats and quicklime) and the details more authentic (film critic
David Ehrenstein points out that the story about the blueberries--
that Robert De Niro's "Ace" Rothstein actually ordered them counted
into each muffin--is true); as for the poetry of small-time losers
who snatch their measure of happiness from an unfeeling world, you
could do better looking at Louis Malle's marvelous 1980
film "Atlantic City."

It doesn't help that Kramer, directing his first feature, doesn't
seem confident enough that his script or story or cast will hold our
interest; he has to tart things up with jazzy editing and endless
camera swoops meant to denote, oh I don't know, visual excitement or
something--that, and the fact that the ending is so unremittingly
optimistic I can't help but think Disney took over the production
during the final twenty minutes. The film's worth watching, I
suppose, mainly for Bello, Baldwin and Macey, but can you imagine
what a fairly competent craftsman like Steven Soderbergh (who's done
movies set in casinos before) could have done with this?

(First published in Businessworld, 4/21/06)

(Comments? Email me at noelbotevera@...)