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The Cooler
(7/10) Copyright ©
2003 by Tony Medley Bernie Lootz
(William H. Macy) is The Cooler, a person with such bad luck it rubs off
on other gamblers. He owes a huge gambling debt to sociopathic Casino
Manager, Shelly Kaplow (Alec Baldwin), and is working it off by
appearing at tables of lucky gamblers to cool them off. If a guy’s on
a roll, Bernie is paged and told to go to Table 3, or wherever the lucky
gambler might be. Bernie walks up and places a bet and the hot gambler
is suddenly cold. Bernie’s not
much to look at and certainly isn’t a great conversationalist, but
beautiful cocktail waitress Natalie Belisano (Maria Bello) makes a pass
at him. Bernie’s nonplussed, but responds and they start a
relationship. Bernie’s already told Shelly he’s quitting in a few
days, but his relationship with Natalie has affected his ability as a
Cooler, and Shelly doesn’t like that. Then Bernie’s son, Mikey
(Shawn Hatosy), and girl friend, Charlene (Estella Warren), arrive and
things go from bad to worse. Macy, who played
a memorable roll in Fargo, is equally memorable here. He and
Bello and Baldwin portray realistic, believable characters. This is a
gritty, prosaic story of the rough life in Las Vegas. One thing that
detracts from the quality of this film is a gratuitous anti-Catholic
joke, punch line really, at the beginning of the film that had no reason
for being except to make yet another anti-Catholic statement that seems
to now be de rigueur for small-minded Hollywood filmmakers. Too
bad director-writer (with Frank Hannah) Wayne Kramer has chosen to be
branded with this stick because this movie shows talent and the bigoted
line is uncalled-for and
has no relationship to the story. Despite that,
this is an entertaining film. There aren’t a lot of laughs, but it
does present a grim statement about Las Vegas and the people who created
it and made it what it is today, especially the little people nobody
notices, like Bernie and Natalie. We see what an empty, vacuous life
Bernie leads in where and how he lives. Shelly, too, typifies the psyche
of a sociopath, who interacts with people with no emotional involvement
whatever for how his actions affect them. Natalie starts to ride a wave,
but it takes her someplace she never thought she’d go when she started
out. In addition to a snapshot of Las Vegas, this is the story of three
people most would never notice. It’s understated but very well done. November 20,
2003 The End |