La Gagne

I was attracted to this movie when I looked at cast list, but after I watched it I must admit that I felt a bit disappointed. The main problem of this movie is that actors aren't capable of holding this movie on their back. Why? Because of bad script. Although Dillon, Lane and Jones try very hard to take this movie on another level, there is no innovative storytelling and the direction is too ordinary. So for Matt Dillon fans this is watchable movie, just like for admirers of beautiful Diane Lane. Legendary Tommy Lee Jones is always great but this is not movie for him; far below his level. So if you get hooked up by this great cast watch it but don't expect anything big or extraordinary. The only thing that you'll remember about this flick is Diane Lane scenes; rest of it is very forgettable.

Considering the big name cast and lavish production I expected a lot more of this film. The acting for the most part is great, although the story they have to work with is mediocre at best. However the film still warrants watching because of the acting and the stars and some and up and coming young talent.

How do you rate a movie like this, which will never be great, but realizes tolerably, pretty well, a genre shuffle? The genre we might call neo-noir, but perhaps neo-B is better. There is the various filler--jazz, night alley with gleaming wet pavement, lots of bars, a fight club, street jammed with clubs, a elevated train that sparks when the guy and the girl kiss. And neo-filler--more than one woman doing a striptease with feathers and pasties and a bit of French stuff in bed. 1987 pretending to be the 1950s--mom with a little hat coming from church, shiny suits, homely red car. Someplace pretending to be "Chicago," da Big Town. A dice game a smart guy can pretty much always win, even when it's played in many scenes.

And Matt Dillon who's really into it, skinny guy always focused, doing a fine job. A "kid" who can be older, Tintin in a strip club. But it ain't "Drugstore Cowboy."

This is Matt Dillon's best performance by far. This shows why everyone thinks he has such talent. But like most of his other work, this movie is dark and realistic about human nature -- in a word, truthful. All the characters have at least two levels -- the superficial level, and a deeper level which is usually darker and more warped, yet never exaggerated. This film also features a masterful performance by Tommy Lee Jones, an excellent job by Suzy Amis, and Diane Lane's most sensational, most lurid, and deepest performance ever in her depiction of a scheming strip tease queen, the ultimate femme fatale, yet a tortured little girl underneath.

The script is very good, very insightful, very restrained in its depiction of a lurid underworld of raw emotion. It dramatizes a world of sin and depravity, yet the story is at core a morality play in which decency and morality not only survive but thrive in spite of extreme temptations.

A good movie on every level.

This is one of those movies you find on the television in the wee hours of the morning. Matt Dillon does a credible job as a young man trying to break into big time gambling- craps not a skilled game like poker. Of course, he is torn between two women- one good and one rather conniving. Tommy Lee Jones plays a man who wants to break this young upstart. The action is lively and the side stories keep the movie going. The music from the 50's is a nice addition to the sound track.