My Shame List: 'Casino' (1995)
If there's one thing Martin Scorsese loves, it's crime. And Robert De Niro. Two things. If there are two things Martin Scorsese loves, it's crime and Robert De Niro. Not to mention Italian-Americans. OK, the list of things Martin Scorsese loves includes crime, Robert De Niro, and Italian-Americans.
Anyway, I finally watched "Casino."
My Shame List #7: "Casino" (1995)
The shaming.
(This week's guest scolder: Nick Newman, of The Film Stage!)
"Whatsamatta you, Eric? How did you discuss Martin Scorsese without having seen one his crime classics? It’s easy enough to regard 'Casino' as a gloriously entertaining, three-hour odyssey into the diseased heart of gilded success -- but this is also a film that, as you may say, has got it all. One of cinema’s greats displaying work so energetic it’s tiring; intoxicating, vibrant cinematography that puts you right on the gaming floor; a look behind (rather, above) said floor that still, after innumerable viewings, elicits shock and winces; a gruesomely evil, career-best turn from James Woods; a soundtrack that may as well be the wiretap into a gambler’s coke-addled brain; and a final line that’s also the greatest possible cap to the Scorsese-De Niro oeuvre. You should’ve been taken out to the desert for this oversight. (Or, at least, have to see Joe Pesci in his underwear.)"
Why hadn't I seen it before?
I love Martin Scorsese. I will tell you without hesitation that he is one of the five best American directors of the postwar era. (Nobody besides film textbook writers really uses World War II as the dividing point for American cinema, but the practice is starting to spread, sorry.) Yet despite my admiration for ol' Marty, I must shamefully admit that I have never seen eight of the 22 feature films he has made (it was nine before "Casino"), ranging from less important entries like "Boxcar Bertha" to the more significant "Last Temptation of Christ." Every time he makes a new film I think it would be a good occasion to catch up on the previous stuff I missed, and every time I fail to do so. Many of his movies are about lapsed Catholics, people who claim Catholic heritage but don't practice. Maybe I'm a lapsed Scorsesian?
How much of it had I seen?
Not a bit, unless you include having seen "Goodfellas," which is kind of like "Casino." Also, I've been to some casinos.
What did I already know about it before I watched it?
- Sharon Stone -- at the time most famous for "Basic Instinct" -- was nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award for her performance in "Casino." As if that weren't surprising enough, it was the only Oscar nomination the film got, a rarity for a Scorsese movie. Stone lost the Oscar, but later her husband got attacked by a Komodo dragon, so that's funny.
- The film was based on a book by Nicholas Pileggi, whose "Wiseguy" had been the source for "Goodfellas." Pileggi loves the Mafia! Pileggi has a picture of the Mafia above his bed and writes "N.P. + T.M." on all his papers at school.
The watching.
Oh, man, "Casino" sucked me in like a casino, with flashy stuff as soon as you walk in the door and the promise of treasures to come. It starts with a car bomb, for heaven's sake! And then there are two narrators! I am a sucker for dueling narrators, especially when one of them is Joe Pesci as a brutal mob enforcer. "A lotta holes in the desert. And a lotta problems are buried in those holes." Well said, Joe!
The first hour is enthralling. Scorsese depicts Las Vegas of the 1970s as operating on an elaborate system of pay-offs, skimming, bribes, shakedowns, and physical violence -- and I can't get enough of it. Robert De Niro talks to some jerk who acts like a jerk, so Joe Pesci stabs him in the throat with his own pen then kicks him to death? Yes. I endorse this. Ditto the Italian-American actors making broad hand gestures while speaking in thick New York accents about goomahs and whatnot.
One of the Smothers Brothers (I can never remember which is which) as a corrupt state senator? Sure! Don Rickles, Kevin Pollak, Alan King, James Woods, and lots of guys I recognize from "The Sopranos"? More of this, please! De Niro and Pesci's characters butting heads over their wildly different managerial styles? Absolutely.
But after a while "Casino" began to feel like a casino: fun at first, then less fun as the novelty wears off, then you think maybe it's time to leave but you stay for another hour. Scorsese's usual themes (including the ever-present "girls ruin everything") start to lose their appeal when repeated frequently, and something about "Casino" feels like Scorsese performing his greatest hits. This was the eighth time he and De Niro had collaborated, it's an obvious spiritual successor to "Goodfellas," and it has a touch of "Raging Bull" thrown in for good measure. Maybe it's not surprising that De Niro and Scorsese haven't made a movie together since this one. Maybe that partnership had run its course.
Still, even if "Casino" is second-tier Scorsese, it's a meaty and entertaining helping of it. Who else makes movies with such a winning combination of unsettling violence and disarming humor? The brief appearance of a two-bit mobster's old mother (played by Scorsese's own ma) vocalizing disapproval of her son's potty mouth -- run illegal rackets, sure, just watch the swears! -- is a priceless example of the director's gift for whipping comedy and tragedy into a grand, operatic confection.
Previous installments in My Shame List:
6. "Brazil"
