Deal
(2008)
Director: Gil Cates Jr.
Cast: Burt Reynolds, Bret Harrison, Shannon Elizabeth
I'm pretty
content with my life right now, even though it would strike many people
as not being terribly exciting. Aside from going out to buy
groceries or other necessary items, quite often I am content to just
stay home and watch movies either for my web site or for my personal
private pleasure. I don't feel much like traveling right now, but on my
bucket list there are a few places that sometime I would like to visit
for a short time before going home and resuming my dull but satisfying
life. One place that I would really like to visit sometime or another
when the current pandemic is over is Las Vegas. Part of the reason I
would like to visit the city is that
circumstances needed to get there would be easy. There are several
travel agencies a short walk from my home that regularly advertise
affordable flights to Las Vegas that include accommodations at good
hotels in the price. There is a passport office just a couple of blocks
from my home, and a place where I could get travel medical insurance is
just a block from my home. And there is an airport a short drive away
from my home where there are direct flights to Las Vegas each and every
day. So as you can see, getting there would be easy. You may be asking
what I would do once I get there. Well, I have several things on my
bucket list I would like to cross off once getting to Las Vegas. I
would like to simply walk along the streets surrounded by all that
electric glitz and glamour going on all around me. Another thing I'd
like to do would be to go to one of several amusement parks that have
popped up in the city to draw in family tourists. Also, I would like to
see a live stage show (is Wayne Newton still performing in Las Vegas?)
Most of all, I would like to stock up on Rocky Road candy bars made by
the Annabelle Candy Company, since these delicious candy bars are not
available in Canada.
I have a feeling that that above list of things I would
like to do in Las Vegas may have perplexed some of you readers. You may
be thinking that while Las Vegas is famous for those above things, what
about what Las Vegas is really famous for - namely, legalized gambling.
Would I try my hand at gambling at some casino? Well, though I might go
into a casino to check out one of their low cost all you can eat
buffets, it is extremely unlikely that I would risk any of my money at
gambling. There are several reasons for that. The first is that what I
have seen of gambling over the years has made me conclude that gambling
is a losing game for practically anyone. There are very few people who
manage to make a living or a fortune with gambling - the odds are
always in favor of the house. Luck more often than not seems to be the
deciding factor instead of personal skill - there's no intelligence
involved in using a slot machine. That last remark leads to a bigger
reason why I don't think much about gambling. I personally think that
gambling is boring. Some people may think otherwise, but I think a
group of people seating around a table slowly trading cards and
depending heavily on luck instead more on personal skill is enough to
put even the biggest insomniac to sleep. While I am on the subject of
card games, I feel that I should confess another big reason why I have
pretty much no taste for gambling - I know deep down that I would
quickly lose my money. Take poker, for example. I know what a pair is,
what two pairs are, and what three of a kind is.... and that is about
it for my knowledge of various poker hands. As you can see, even the
most amateur poker player I might play against would quickly get all of
my money.
So you can probably understand why I have little taste
or interest towards gambling. I don't even buy lottery tickets.
Probably by now you are wondering why then I decided to both watch and
write a review of the movie Deal,
which involves gamblers, specifically those that play poker. There were
three reasons, as it turns out. The first was that every so often I
like to review a movie with a subject matter I dislike or have no
personal interest in so I can challenge myself. The second reason was
the fact that the movie had Burt Reynolds in it. I've always found
Reynolds to be interesting, and his post-superstar film choices were
often unusual in different ways. The third reason was that the film was
produced independently, but was picked up by a major Hollywood
distributor. Ultimately, the distributor only put the movie in a few
theaters before sending it to DVD, but the fact that they had picked it
up did promise it was a professional production in at least some
aspects. The central character of Deal is a
college student named Alex (Harrison, The
Astronaut Wives Club).
Though studying for a law degree, his real passion is the game of
poker, which he likes to play with friends as well as online. He
eventually manages to qualify for a televised poker tournament. Alex
manages to get to the finals, but
ultimately is defeated by a better player. Despite losing, Alex's
performance does not go unnoticed. Tommy (Reynolds, Navajo
Joe),
a legendary poker player who retired years ago, sees potential in Alex.
Tommy contacts Alex with an offer to help train him to be a top poker
player. Alex eventually agrees, and the training starts. Though there
are some stumbles along the way, Alex eventually starts to get better
and better at poker though Tommy's lessons and tips. And through Tommy,
Alex meets an attractive woman named Michelle (Elizabeth, American Pie),
and a relationship of sorts starts between them. But Alex does not know
that Tommy may be hiding some things, including an itch to get back in
the game. And that might mean eventually the teacher will be competing
directly against his student.
Let me remind you that when I sat down to watch Deal,
I realized that I had in my mind two obstacles that might prevent me
from appreciating it more than many other people. As I said, I find
poker playing in real life to be boring, and before the movie I knew
very little about the various intricacies that come with this game. To
tell the truth, I was hoping this movie would focus on poker as much as
The Baltimore Bullet
focused on pool playing. No such luck here - the movie has plenty of
scenes with its characters playing the game. But what really made all
that poker playing in Deal
fairly unbearable for me was that it was not presented in a manner that
I could digest. The movie more often than not seems to assume that
everyone watching it understands all the rules and techniques of poker.
Quite frankly, I didn't know what was happening most of the time
watching the various games, and I think that a lot of other viewers
will be as bewildered as I was. That's not to say that the movie didn't
have a chance to educate newbies on the game. When Tommy recruits Alex
and in short notice starts to train him, the movie could have used this
part of the movie to explain a few things about poker to the audience.
But this does not happen. Instead, Tommy subjects Alex to hours and
hours of videotaped poker tournaments with the advice, "You play the
player," explaining that you have to study the other players with
things like gestures and unconscious actions. Now, had the movie gone
into depth about this lesson, we could have learned some things that
would not only be entertaining, but educational as well. But instead,
this particular kind of poker training only gets a minute at most of
screen time.
There's another problem with the poker scenes. Director
(and co-writer) Gil Cates Jr. doesn't manage to make these scenes
particularly exciting; I think even experts on poker will find all the
scenes of poker somewhat dull. The participants again and again treat
the game as, well, a game and not a real passion. Even the last twenty
minutes of the movie, which concern the climactic poker tournament
finals, are directed in this casual fashion. It certainly doesn't help
that it's explained that not only will all of the five or so remaining
finalists walk away with a serious hunk of money, but that who will be
the grand prize winner is blatantly telegraphed to the audience even
before the first round of the tournament is played. There's no real
taste of drama in any of this poker. Or, for that matter, in the parts
of the movie where the characters are not playing poker. Take the part
of the movie that concerns Tommy's relationship with his wife Helen
(Maria Mason, Last
Holiday).
When Helen finds out that against her wishes her husband has been
getting involved in poker again, do they have an in-depth conversation?
No - she walks out on him after a few seconds and the scene ends. Later
on, when she wants more of an explanation, does she approach Tommy? No
- she talks to a family friend (Charles Durning in a cameo) for a few
seconds, and then the scene ends. Finally, she does travel to Las Vegas
to confront Tommy again, and she gives him her blessing to play in the
upcoming tournament. But again, the drama only goes on for a few
seconds before cutting to the next scene.
This subplot is not the only one in Deal
that fails to be exploited to its fullest. The character of Alex gets
tangled with his parents' expectations that he stick with his job as a
law clerk despite his dreams of being a professional poker player, but
this subplot is so hardly explored and gets resolved so quickly that
you have to wonder why Cates even bothered to put this in. It probably
comes as no surprise that not just because of this weak subplot, the
character of Alex ends up being a pretty boring and colorless lead
character. We never learn just what drives him to play poker and risk
his future on his dream. Apparently actor Bret Harrison didn't know
what to make of this character as well, because his performance lacks
the drive and go-for-it risk taking the character should have had. As
for Burt Reynolds, he gives a performance that clearly shows a great
deal of disinterest, and I can't blame him for that. The character of
Tommy is kind of aloof and hard to get a finger on. At one point, he
tells Alex that while once he was at the top of his game, he all of a
sudden lost his confidence. Why, and how? It is never explained. The
character ends up being just as dull as his student. With the script,
direction, and acting in Deal
being pretty dead in the water, the only thing that caught my attention
was the movie's production design. Despite having a tight budget ($5
million), the movie does have an acceptable look, from the
cinematography to the sets. It's not spectacular, but it does get this
part of the movie fairly well done. Other than that, however, finding
yourself having an entertaining time with this movie simply isn't in
the cards.
(Posted October 11, 2020)
Check for availability on Amazon (DVD)
See also: The Last Run, Navajo Joe, Our Winning
Season
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