The Gambler **** (1974, James Caan, Paul Sorvino, Lauren Hutton) – Classic Movie Review 1974

Director Karel Reisz’s visceral but cerebral 1974 thriller stars James Caan as college literature professor Axel Freed, who has a secret vice as a compulsive gambler with a masochistic urge to lose and an inability to stop gambling. This leads to losing all his money and, under threat from his deep debts, he borrows from his girlfriend, then his mother and finally some gangsters who chase after him. In massive debt to a violent loan shark, he takes one more huge risk to try to escape his fate of eventual final self-destruction.

James Toback’s seriously heavyweight screenplay, a loose adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s classic novella The Gambler, complete with references to Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment (1866), occasionally threatens to stop being a thriller and simply turn pretentious. But Reisz’s controlled direction, the rock-solid character acting and the powerhouse star performance from the often underrated Caan keep the film firmly on track.

Harrowing but rewarding, this is addictive, thinking persons’ drama, with a tough tone, much violence and a barrage of strong language. It had an R rating or 18 certificate.

Paul Sorvino and Lauren Hutton also star. Morris Carnovsky, Jacqueline Brookes, Burt Young. James Woods, M Emmet Walsh, Vic Tayback and Stuart Margolin co-star.

After meeting Robert De Niro to discuss his wish for the star role, Reisz said that he would not consider him for the role and told Toback that if he kept insisting on De Niro he would be dumped from the film.

Remade in 2014 with Mark Wahlberg.

The 1997 Fyodor Dostoyevsky adaptation The Gambler is the last film of double Oscar-winner Luise Rainer, who died on Tuesday 30 December 2014 of pneumonia at the grand old age of 104.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 1974

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