…Damn, all these reviews in a row is starting to really up my tolerance for puns. Anyway, the remake of The Gambler is one of those movies that should work but just never really comes together. It’s got a great cast, a hand-picked soundtrack of forgotten soul classics, crisp direction, and a script that allows for occasionally riveting dialogue, but much like its hero: there’s just something missing at the core. Most of the reviews mention that the original Gambler is far superior and will ruin this one, but I haven’t seen it and this film still didn’t work for me.
What Works: The cast is (forgive my puns dear readers) aces with Michael K. Williams, Jessica Lange, Brie Larson, Andre Braugher (but only for a 10 second scene though), and even Richard Schiff in a solid cameo role as a pawn broker. But nobody tops John Goodman, who’s terrific in an all-too-brief role. He’s easily the best thing in the movie, and even though you don’t need a full hand to count his scenes, every one of them makes a huge impact. With a shaved head, and usually shirtless, his poetic and fiercely intelligent loan shark sees right through our stumble-bum hero, and those are the rare moments in the film that feel honest…
What Doesn’t: …For a film that so desperately wants to be gritty and realistic, “The Gambler” really isn’t. There are some scenes that feel like pure horse shit—like pretty much any that involve Wahlberg teaching his class as the world’s most unlikely English professor—and there’s also something naggingly incomplete about Wahlberg’s character and even performance. Wahlberg can be a master at understatement (Three Kings, The Fighter), but he never seems convincing in this role. He can sit at the black jack table and piss away a fortune, but his face can’t convey what his character gets out of it. Wahlberg is miscast because he’s not an actor really built for weakness: he can do confused (I Heart Huckabees), he can do stupid (Pain and Gain), and he can even do in-over-his-head (Boogie Nights), but he can’t play the kind of guy who’s got a gambling addiction gnawing away at his life.
Wahlberg’s character also comes across as excessively dickish, but it seems more like flippant script tactics than something a professional lowlife could really be. There are literally a dozen scenes where he’s in a position of having to ask someone for money, but is an asshole about it or flat out gives money away. You wonder how a beggar became such a chooser, and in the “real life” this movie seems all-too-removed from I’m not sure he really could be that picky.
What I Would Have Done Differently: Jake Gyllenhaal nailed it by losing weight and getting in touch with his inner worm in Nightcrawler. I don’t blame Wahlberg for wanting to break himself off a piece of that prestige, but I also can’t help but wonder what it would look like if Gyllenhaal were in this role instead. Also, I would have done a complete top to bottom rewrite of the script (save some of the punchier dialogue), but that’s another matter.