Rent The Killing of a Chinese Bookie on Amazon Video (paid link)
Written by: John Cassavetes
Directed by: John Cassavetes
Starring: Ben Gazzara, Timothy Carey, Seymour Cassel
Rated: R
Watch the trailer
Plot
A proud strip club owner is forced to come to terms with himself as a man when his gambling addiction gets him in hot water with the mob who offer him only one alternative.
Verdict
This is a slow burn movie that focuses not on the action, but the moments in between. I appreciate what Cassavetes is doing as he creates the character of Cosmo, but this reaches a point where it's just long. The plot is spread so thin that by the end I was getting bored.
Skip it.
Review
Cassavetes shoots like you're in the scene. A Woman Under the Influence is like that, and it makes the movie uncomfortable. There's a certain raw quality that makes it feel almost like a documentary because we're in the room while people chat. We watch Coslo chat up a passerby on the street. A typical movie would never take the time for a scene like that.
There is a 1978 directors cut that is thirty minutes shorter. The pacing is better, but it loses nuance.
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| Ben Gazzara plays Cosmo. |
Gazzara plays Coslo a strip club owner with a gambling problem. He gets out of debt and celebrates by gambling right back into debt. Everything he's presumably worked for hangs in the balance. Only a guy that built it would care that much. While he runs a strip club, he cares about the dancers and the club. In the midst of the mob pushing him to commit murder, he calls the club and asks what show they're putting on.
It's certainly a slow movie, but it creates a mood. I like Cassavetes style even if I wouldn't watch this again. You wont' see this type of movie made today because no one would ever make a movie that moves this slowly.
Even the star Gazzara thought the movie was too slow and that's what prompted the directors' cut. The longer this goes the more bored I got. The plot is solid, but this gets indeterminably long.
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