I hope I remember how to do this!
First off,
let me say that if you’re glad to see a new post from me, you have Allen Kessler and
Ann-Margret to thank (now there’s a pair I never thought I’d put together in
the same sentence!).
I could
explain that right now, but if you remember my blog from the glory days you
know I almost never get to the point right away. I take my time. And since this is my first blog post in over
half a year, I will likely get even more sidetracked than usual, if that’s
possible. Sorry. You have the option now of not reading this at
all, or scanning it until you come to the part where I actually get to the main
point of this post.
You see, this
post is actually a movie review. The
movie is the 1982 “classic,” Lookin’ to Get Out.
Here’s the
first fork in the road I’m taking. It is
actually quite appropriate that I return to this blog after being missing in
action for over six months with a movie review because watching movies is now
my main leisure time activity, replacing poker thanks to the various lockdowns
that started back in March, 2020. Suddenly,
I couldn’t go out and play poker every week (and for awhile, I couldn’t go out
and do anything—for that matter, I couldn’t go out at all). Remember that? If you lived in California you do. And since I couldn’t play poker, I had
nothing to blog about. So I got
completely out of the rhythm of writing blog posts every night. What took up my time, you ask?
An old hobby
I never really abandoned but suddenly had a lot more time for—watching old
movies. I mean old. Mostly from the 30’s, 40’s and 50’s. Oh sure there were movies from the 60’s
forward that I watched and enjoyed, and even movies that were practically
new. But old films got most of my
attention. Fortunately I had access to
Turner Classic Movies, which may have saved my life. And when I switched to YouTubeTV, I suddenly had a virtual DVR that was able to
hold an unlimited number of movies (TV shows too). I have nearly 2,500 movies on that DVR at
this moment, most of them from TCM. Plus
there’s Netflix, Amazon Prime and Disney +.
I’m not likely to run out of movies to watch anytime in my next three
lifetimes. Of course, not all of those movies on the DVR will ever be watched
and a lot of them I’ve already watched, but there’s no way to delete them, you
just have to let them “expire” automatically after nine months.
If you’re
interested, my favorite genres are film noirs, pre-code films and screwball
comedies. But I’ve watched films from
virtually every conceivable genre over the past three years. I’ve even watched Bette Davis melodramas.
As a kid I
always loved old films, and while attending UCLA in the ‘70’s I took two film
courses that introduced me to some great movies I hadn’t seen or even heard of
before. I wish I still had the lists I
made of the films I saw then, but whenever I come across one of them now, I usually
remember if I saw them in a class. Great films I do remember from those classes
include High Noon (my all-time favorite western), Ninotchka, Mr. Deeds Goes to
Town, Holiday, and You Can’t Take it With You. And so many more.
I was on
Twitter a lot and suddenly no one was tweeting about poker (because no one was
playing it), which was the main reason I joined it in the first place. But I found Twitter accounts that talked
about movies, and some specialized in the old movies I was most interested in.
I get recommendations from them all the time. You may see me interact with some
of these accounts from time to time, commenting on the movies they recommend
(especially when they recommend good ones).
So it isn’t
unusual for me to watch a movie based on a Twitter recommendation, but I never
expected to get a movie recommendation from Allen Kessler (come on, you knew
I’d get back to him eventually). Does
anyone reading this not know who Allen Kessler is? Since I can’t hear you answering, I’ll tell
you that Allen, nicknamed “Chainsaw,” is a professional poker player and
gambler. He is known for being extremely picky about tournament structures and
rake, for never paying for a meal (he gets comped a whole lot) and for his
generosity in sharing his comps with his friends. He was probably one of my first follows on
Twitter and he follows me as well. We’ve
interacted on Twitter any number of times.
But I never
met him in person until this past October.
I was playing in a tournament at Orleans and on the break I recognized
him sitting at a tournament table that I walked by on the way to the restroom. He was playing a different tournament than I
was (no doubt a “mixed game” tourney which he prefers to NLH). I couldn’t help recognizing him from all the
pics of him I’ve seen on Twitter and elsewhere.
I’m not sure I even intended to say this out loud, but as I was about to
pass him, the word “Chainsaw” audibly escaped my lips. He looked up and I said hi and told him I was
“robvegaspoker” and of course he knew me from Twitter. He was in the middle of the hand and I didn’t
want to be late back from break so that was the extent of our interaction.
That incident
has nothing to do with why he’s responsible for this blog post buy you know how
I am. Just the other day, on Twitter,
Allen posted a link to a movie that was available free on YouTube (it’s amazing
how many good movies are available on YouTube for free—high quality prints in
many cases, too). That movie was Lookin’ to Get Out (see, I got back
there, eventually). Allen said about the
film, “This is my favorite gambling movie of all time. Enjoy!”
Well, now, if
a famous (and infamous?) and prolific gambler like Allen Kessler claims a movie
is his all time favorite gambling movie, well, I just have to take note. I gotta figure Kessler knows what he’s
talking about, or at least there’s a good chance he does. Since he hasn’t discussed movies much on
Twitter (to my recollection anyway), I didn’t know how well his tastes in film
align with mine, but I just had to give him some respect based on the subject
being gambling movies and he being a pro at that very occupation.
Then I did
what I always do these days when someone mentions I movie I might want to
watch. I checked the IMDB rating. It was 5.1. I won’t go into the intricacies of the IMDB
rating system, (at last a tangent I won’t go on!) but when I’m looking over the
movie listings I check IMDB and generally use “7” as the minimum for a movie I’ll
watch (this is a consensus rating “voted” on by the users of IMDB). I’ll definitely consider lower rated movies
depending on the cast, the director, the subject matter and personal
recommendations I get (from Twitter or otherwise). For sure, movies that rate a 6.4, for
example, have been known to surprise me and have been found vastly underrated
by no less an expert than yours truly. But
man, that 5.1 is really, really, really low!
I had to
reconsider. What do I know about Allen
Kessler? I know he gambles for a
living. I knew he loves Jeopardy and
Wheel of Fortune. But do I know if he
likes Citizen Kane? Do I know if likes
Casablanca? Does he agree with me that
Vertigo is the best ever Hitchcock movie?
Does he even like Hitchcock? If
he doesn’t, he can be dismissed as not having anything meaningful to say about
film. Well, it seemed like a bad idea to
present him with a movie quiz just to follow one of his movie
recommendations. It would probably take
longer than just watching the damn movie and deciding for myself whether or not
I liked it.
I looked at
the cast. Jon Voight was the star. Ok, a good actor for sure. Good actors have been known to make some
terrible movies though. Burt Young.
Wasn’t he in the Rocky movies?
Those were good, that was a plus.
And
then….then, I saw the name Ann-Margret.
Ann-Margret!
Let me just
say that as an owner of a y-chromosome who came of age in the ‘60’s, I believe
it is in my DNA to love Ann-Margret. For
my money, she is the sexiest woman I’ve ever seen.
So if you
have Ann-Margret in your movie you have my attention. And that tipped the scales in favor of giving
this 5.1 film a try.
No doubt some
of you are recalling that Ms. Margret was in another gambling movie earlier in
her career. In fact, she was in one of
the all-time great poker movies, The Cincinnati Kid (1965), which has
a 7.2 rating on IMDB (should be much higher).
She doesn’t have a big role, but it is important and she looks
incredibly good (not a difficult feat for her in those days). I’m sure at least 99% of you have seen it,
right? If not, drop everything and watch
it ASAP. Just a terrific poker movie
that stars the great Steve McQueen and the legendary Edward G. Robinson. I’ve seen a boatload of Robinson films these
past three years and even if the movie is less than stellar you can count on
him to give a riveting performance (same with James Cagney and of course,
Humphrey Bogart).
But I digress
(that’s so unlike me). The movie in question is Lookin’ to Get Out.
And to be honest, it is not a great movie.
In fact, it might not even be a good movie. It is a Jon Voight vanity project. In
addition to starring, he co-wrote the script, and his production company
produced it. His (then) 7-year old daughter has one scene in it (her movie
debut). You know her now as Angelina
Jolie (speaking of sexy women—but definitely not in this movie). His soon-to-be ex-wife (and Angelina’s
mother) also has a brief scene in the film.
It’s a comedy
I guess. I suppose there’s a bit of
seriousness about gambling addiction and also about male friendship. It’s a buddy-movie (Voight and Young). It has a familiar plot: Gamblers Voight and
Young lose a lot of money to bad people you really shouldn’t be losing money to
if you value your knee-caps and other body parts, or your life for that matter. To try to raise the money to pay the debt,
the only thing they can think of is to gamble more, only this time, win. Of course!
Because that’s what compulsive gamblers do.
Ann-Margret
plays a woman from Voight’s past. If you
have ever seen a movie before, you know when they meet again they both start
having those old feelings for each other. Surprise! This causes complications on top of the
gambling debt
A lot of
totally outrageous things happen, many are quite unrealistic. There are more
than the movie’s share of “Oh, come on” moments (as in, no one would ever do
that). When the movie turns to outright
comedy, it tends to go overboard.
There’s a long chase scene that goes on way too long. But it’s very funny for most of it. Similarly, there is an outrageous fight scene
inside a casino that they didn’t know when to end (hint: sooner than they
did). But did I laugh and enjoy it? You bet (so to speak).
There’s also
a pretty awesome extended blackjack scene.
That’s the game the boys play to try to get their gambling loses
back. That is really a great scene,
thoroughly enjoyed that.
This was
filmed in 1980 and Ann-Margret looked like, well, Ann-Margret. She was gorgeous and sexy. She had big hair. And she is and was a very underrated actress.
One thing I
have to mention is the setting of the film.
After starting out in New York, the boys hit Vegas to strike it rich. Most of the movie takes place in Vegas, and
it was filmed at the MGM Grand. However,
it wasn’t the MGM you know today. This
was filmed when the MGM was located where Bally’s is today. No wait, I mean, where the Horseshoe is. Yeah, that property started out at the MGM,
then it was Bally’s for like forever and is now the Horseshoe. The MGM sold it and then bought the property
they now own on Tropicana. Got that
straight? From the exterior, you
actually see the Barbary Coast (ah, the good old days) more than the MGM.
More
important, this is my Vegas. This is the Vegas I first knew and fell in love
with. It was a real treat to see this
Vegas right there in front of me. As I said, it was shot in 1980. That is the first year I ever went to
Vegas. I know this Vegas! One of the things I loved about the movie is
that it took me back there. Also, 1980
was the year of the famous MGM fire.
Coincidentally, the last day of filming was when the fire hit. Amazing.
So despite
this not be a great film, I loved it. It
was just a lot of fun, faults and all.
This is definitely not The Cincinnati Kid, or Rounders
(except for a very early scene, there’s no poker in it). It’s more about friendship and discipline (or
lack thereof) than gambling. But there
is a great payoff to the gambling story I won’t spoil.
Because of
the flaws, I am hesitant to unconditionally recommend it, although I suspect
readers of this blog will have a head start in liking it.
But I can say
I had a lot of fun watching it. A lot.
Thanks,
Allen.
(Note: I supposed I should have put a pic of Allen
with this post instead of Ann-Margret.
But then I would have felt obligated to ask Allen for a picture or at
least for his permission to use one, so I decided that even Allen would prefer looking
at a picture of Ann-Margret rather than one of himself.)