Online Gambling and Poker experience in film: "The Prowler", "Roadhouse", "Casino", etc.

Wayne Tedrow Jr. (Las Vegas, 6/14/68) Wayne returned to Vegas. Pete B. moved to Vegas for a Carlos Marcello gig. It was January ‘64. Pete heard that Wendell Durfee had fled back to Vegas. He told Wayne. Wayne went after Wendell. Three colored dope fiends got in the way. Pete was hopped up on the Cuban exile cause. Vietnam was getting hot. Howard Hughes was nurturing crazy plans to buy up Las Vegas.

He’d rigged a lab in his hotel suite. Beakers, vats and Bunsen burners filled up wall shelves. A three-burner hot plate juked small-batch conversions. He hadn’t cooked dope since Saigon. He was a sergeant on Vegas PD. He was married. He had a chemistry degree. His father was a big Mormon fat cat. Wendell Durfee shivved a casino dealer. It didn’t matter. The Casino Operators’ Council wanted Wendell clipped. Vegas cops got those jobs. They were choice gigs with big bonus money. They were tests. -BLOOD’S A ROVER by James Ellroy

  "Every time I hit Las Vegas take a good look at it just to make sure it's still there" -"The Prowler" (1951) directed by Joseph Losey Officer Webb Garwood (Van Heflin) returns to Susan Gilvray's (Evelyn Keyes) residence initiating a romantic relationship game. With no prowler in sight, a looming Californian hacienda in front of him and a beautiful woman alone inside, Garwood decides to take on the titular role without even changing out of his uniform.

 

He and Susan reunite and Webb pledges both innocence and love. The couple gets married. Webb quits the police department and fulfills his dream: buying a truck stop motel next to a busy freeway in Las Vegas, Nevada! Garwood believes that his ship has finally come in. A closer view reveals that Webb's ambition isn't a gold bargain.

  More than any other city, Las Vegas has long had the reputation of being the place to go for reinvention. From its humble land auction beginnings in 1905, people came to Las Vegas starting their lives over. Long before the gambling, neon and showgirls appeared, Las Vegas was a small town like thousands of others across the country. Slot and video poker machines provide the bulk of main revenues in Las Vegas, along with traditional casino games such as poker, blackjack, craps, baccarat, roulette, etc. It's a good advice to ask your dealer for help and strategies, and it's also polite to give your dealer a 'toke' (tip) particularly if you're winning, placing a chip on the layout (the area where you place your bet) for the dealer to collect if your bet at craps wins.

  Slot-machine and video poker players earn comps by joining a casino player's club. Many casinos, armed with profitability studies developed by MBAs, were replacing their card tables with high limit slot machines and other traditional table games such as blackjack or poker.

Sharon Stone as Ginger McKenna in "Casino" (1995) directed by Martin Scorsese.

  Based on the book by Larry Shandling and Nicholas Pileggi, "Casino" was directed by Martin Scorsese, starring Robert De Niro as Sam "Ace" Rothstein, a character based on Frank Rosenthal, who ran casinos in Las Vegas in the 70’s, most notably the Stardust casino (gambling, poker games, etc.)

  “The town will never be the same. After the Tangiers, the big corporations took it all over. Today it looks like Disneyland. And while the kids play cardboard pirates, Mommy and Daddy drop the house payments and Junior’s college money on the poker slots. In the old days, dealers knew your name, what you drank, what you played." —Ace Rothstein (Rober De Niro in "Casino")

  Jodie Foster plays in "Maverick" (1994) a scheming southern belle and a skillful poker player. Bret Maverick (Mel Gibson) is attempting to enter a five-card draw tournament to prove that he is the best poker player. He needs an additional $3,000 to participate in the $25,000 event. In the town of Crystal Rivers he meets two other poker players: Foster’s Annabelle and Angel, played by Alfred Molina.

  The tournament hits a high point when it’s down to three players: Maverick, Angel and The Commodore: While the odds of Gibson’s Ace of Spades draw are low (52 cards in a deck) the Commodore has four of a kind (eights) and Angel has a low straight flush. In the third act, the poker fans will be delighted since the interactions are all secondary to the poker action, which is some of the best captured on film.

  Paul Newman playing poker in "The Sting" (1973)

  After Henry Gondorf (Paul Newman) and John Hooker (Robert Redford) spot Doyle Lonnegan (Robert Shaw), a high-stakes gambler during a poker game, they come up with a cunning method of manipulating him into placing sure bets on fixed horse races.

  "The Sting" on Top 250 #99 in Imdb List won 7 Oscars in 1974 - Best Picture, Best Director: George Roy Hill, Best Writing, Story and Screenplay Based on Factual Material or Material Not Previously Published: David S. Ward, Best Film Editing: William Reynolds, Best Music, Scoring Original Song Score and/or Adaptation, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Julia Phillips became the first female producer to win the Best Picture category.

  The incorporation of gambling, casinos, poker and other games in movies goes all the way back to the 1930's with "Gambling Lady" starring Barbara Stanwyck.

  Yvonne de Carlo and Dan Duryea playing the roulette in "River Lady" (1948) directed by George Sherman

  Dan Duryea, the onetime advertising copywriter turned actor, became synonymous with a particularly decadent and insidious form of evil, Catch "Criss Cross" (1949) for a prototypical Duryea performance as Slim Dundee, a well-dressed gambler and syndicate boss who could teach Dennis Hopper a few tricks about sneering with nasty intent.

  Duryea reserves his most chilling glares for Steve Thompson (Burt Lancaster), the viral, young buck one married to Dundee's wife, Anna (Yvonne De Carlo) Sultry Anna longs to burn again in Steve's arms, but how can she manage without the money from her sugar daddy Slim?

  Ida Lupino as the wise-cracking dame Lily Stevens in "Road House" (1948) directed by Jean Negulesco: Ida Lupino plays a barroom singer who loves to play poker solitaires and who shows her sangfroid as she tries to flee from Jefty’s increasingly unhinged grasp. And there’s a remarkable sexual transference of power when Lily takes matters —and Jefty’s gun— into her own hands.

  Jefty (Richard Widmark) says of Lily as he falls to the ground: "I told you she was different".

New publicity stills of Jake Gyllenhaal in "October Sky" (1999)

Jake Gyllenhaal as Homer Hickam in "October Sky" (1999) directed by Joe Johnston - Publicity Stills

Manhandled (1949) clip, starring Dan Duryea and Dorothy Lamour

Manhandled (1949) directed by Lewis R. Foster, starring Dan Duryea, Dorothy Lamour and Sterling Hayden.

Dan Duryea and Dorothy Lamour as Karl Benson and Merl Kramer in "Manhandled" (1949)

"With Dan Duryea in the main role of Karl Benson, a crooked private eye, Manhandled might have been a true classic in that series of thrillers dealing with the degraded cop or investigator. As it is, due to the extremely convoluted plot and slack direction, the film lacks suspense, and it never develops the true potential of its characters and locales. However, the opening dream sequence and the scene in which Benson crushes Redman with his car is quite evocative of the noir style and rates a middle of the road place in that genre with two and three quarters stars" Source: www.thrillingdetective.com

‘Source Code’ Being Adapted Into a TV Series For CBS - Jake Gyllenhaal's StarChild T-Shirt

Jake Gyllenhaal as Colter Stevens in Source Code (2011) - Publicity Stills by Iheartjakemedia.com

Jake Gyllenhaal with Duncan Jones attending the premiere of "Source Code" in Berlin, Germany, on 7th April 2011

"Producer Mark Gordon (Criminal Minds) plans to bring the sci-fi body-jumping thriller ‘Source Code’ to CBS – but what alterations to the Source Code set-up will have to be changed for it to fit as a weekly procedural? Released in April of this year, Source Code was director Duncan Jones’ follow-up to his acclaimed science fiction mystery, Moon. Source Code performed well in theaters, pulling in over $123 million worldwide, and catching on even more with audiences due to a VOD window two weeks prior to the film’s release on DVD and Blu-ray. Critics also liked the film, with it eventually tallying an impressive 91% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Jake Gyllenhaal and Michelle Monaghan as Colter Stevens and Christina Warren in "Source Code" (2011)

Of course, for the series to work, Source Code would have to do without much of what made the film appealing in the first place –
and no, not just Gyllenhaal and his lovely co-star Michelle Monaghan. Much of the film centered on the mystery of Colton Stevens’ involvement with the source code, and his desire to not only acquire the identity of the bomber, but to also save the lives of those on the train – namely Christina Warren (Monaghan).

That means the memory loss and twist regarding a source code participant’s physical state, not to mention the overarching implications of source code, may not play into the series – which is, at the very least, a minus. This is just speculation, however, as Steve Meade (Lost, Lie to Me) is currently penning the pilot’s script, so no word yet on what (if any) changes will take place". Source: screenrant.com

Jake Gyllenhaal collaborates with National Dance Institute - EOY StarChild Design Auction (June 17, 2011): Celebrities extend their support to the National Dance Institute to transform/inspire NYC public school children through the StarChild T-Shirt 2011 Gala Auction.

‘Source Code’ Being Adapted Into a TV Series For CBS

Jake Gyllenhaal as Colter Stevens in Source Code (2011) - Publicity Stills

Jake Gyllenhaal with Duncan Jones attending the premiere of "Source Code" in Berlin, Germany, on 7th April 2011

"Producer Mark Gordon (Criminal Minds) plans to bring the sci-fi body-jumping thriller ‘Source Code’ to CBS – but what alterations to the Source Code set-up will have to be changed for it to fit as a weekly procedural? Released in April of this year, Source Code was director Duncan Jones’ follow-up to his acclaimed science fiction mystery, Moon. Source Code performed well in theaters, pulling in over $123 million worldwide, and catching on even more with audiences due to a VOD window two weeks prior to the film’s release on DVD and Blu-ray. Critics also liked the film, with it eventually tallying an impressive 91% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Of course, for the series to work, Source Code would have to do without much of what made the film appealing in the first place – and no, not just Gyllenhaal and his lovely co-star Michelle Monaghan. Much of the film centered on the mystery of Colton Stevens’ involvement with the source code, and his desire to not only acquire the identity of the bomber, but to also save the lives of those on the train – namely Christina Warren (Monaghan).

That means the memory loss and twist regarding a source code participant’s physical state, not to mention the overarching implications of source code, may not play into the series – which is, at the very least, a minus. This is just speculation, however, as Steve Meade (Lost, Lie to Me) is currently penning the pilot’s script, so no word yet on what (if any) changes will take place. Source: screenrant.com

Jake Gyllenhaal collaborates with National Dance Institute - EOY StarChild Design Auction (June 17, 2011): Celebrities extend their support to the National Dance Institute to transform/inspire NYC public school children through the StarChild T-Shirt 2011 Gala Auction.