Il casinò della paura

Good-looking production values here; obviously this thing had a middling decent budget, well used by an efficient, professional director (Sidney J. Furie). Unfortunately, nothing - and I mean NOTHING - here seemed completely new or original. EVERYTHING is a recycled cliché of the crime / revenge drama genre. Disgraced ex-cop (Weller) looking for answers among the crooks who framed him arrives in Las Vegas. He is also trying to reconnect with his estranged ex-wife (Carrere). Did I mention the crime boss who has a grudge against him (Hopper)? The problem isn't any one of these elements, it's all of them. There is just nothing new here. Peter Weller can carry a picture, and Tia Carrere makes a gorgeous object of desire and longing, plus Dennis Hopper makes a good villain, but we have seen them all do that before. The script gives them no new business, and over-familiar character types to work with. Every plot twist has been used before, every segment has a familiar feel to it. Las Vegas looks great and is well used visually as a setting, but I already mentioned that this is a professional, slick looking production. I found myself almost shouting at the screen to give me something I hadn't seen before. Didn't happen. Tia Carrere's cheekbones were the only things that kept me watching all the way to the end.

Not bad at all, but unless you are completely new to the crime drama genre, you will be hard pressed to find anything much entertaining here.

Ex-cop Ray Mercer gets released from jail and is picked up by his estranged wife Rebecca. She is now seeing casino boss Charles Atlas and they stop off at one of his casinos on the ride to a cheap hotel for Ray. When in the casino Ray idly plays the games with his last few dollars and wins the jackpot. However before he can collect his money the casino is robbed – leaving Ray not only trying to get his prize money but mistaken as part of the gang. With double crosses and shootouts all over the place, all Ray wants is his winnings.

This promises much – look at the cast to see the potential. However what it delivers can be summed up buy it's weak plot. The story essentially sees Ray Mercer put in lots of action scenes – using the thinnest of excuses to keep the story moving. For example Ray jumps onto an armoured car and hangs on the roof, the truck then crashes and drives through a huge explosion – but Ray is unharmed. Likewise, we have the bad guys who do the robbery spend the whole film running round the hotel killing everyone looking for a way out – but yet the armed police on the ground floor cant seem to catch them!

To be fair, the spectacle is good – but it's bangs without substance. The action is OTT – does no one ever run out of bullets? The action has no real tension or excitement to it and is really dull – if you just want guns then you might like this, but really it's a poor action movie.

It's a shame because they managed to get a great cast on board. Weller and Tia Carrere are OK names and give OK performances. But add to that names like Dennis Hopper and Joe Pantoliano and you've got a good cast. Unfortunately none of them have anything to work with at all. The support cast also has plenty of familiar faces but again they are little more than cardboard cutouts who are there to get shot at or shoot people. These include Tagawa (from Mortal Kombat), Kove (Karate Kid, Cagney & Lacey), Peter Coyote (Sphere, Patch Adams).

Overall this is really daft plotting at it's worst. The action fails to ignite any interest and the whole think flops badly. What a way to waste a great cast – the director has been making films since the 50's – has he learnt nothing in all that time?

Yes, it looks like a big bloated bomb. The production values aren't exactly top-notch. The camera angles are often far off, the acting can be very misguided (maldirected), some areas of bad sound, and David Alan Grier is in it. All are signs of a bomb to watch out for.

But surprisingly, this is one to watch. It has a unique story which is beefed up with actually funny jokes and genuinely offbeat characters. The action scenes are very well done, too. It has many old-school action sequences with no CGI's and great stunts. Its got nicely done shootouts and an excellent car chase, but somehow it doesn't feel structured around and for the action. It keeps its focus on the story, which I'll get to...now.

A uniquely fun Peter Weller plays an ex-cop, ex-con who gets out of jail on parole. The first thing on his agenda is to knock off his ex-wife's new husband (Dennis Hopper in one of his most generic performances to date) by swindling a way to win the jackpot at his casino. Or is his (HOT) wife Tia Carerra (at her most hot) in on it too? This one is, out of a lot of reasons, unnoticed because a bigger-budget but sub-par movie called "Ocean's Eleven" happened to be released four years later. "Top of the World" is much better, because the action is better and it doesn't need cutesy and lame humor to seek a wide audience's approval. Plus, I'd pick Peter Weller over George Clooney any day of the week...not to mention Julia Roberts isn't even 1/1,000,000 of Tia Carerra.

This film is without doubt the most insignificant movie I've ever seen. Peter Weller did a very good job on keeping his face in exactly the same shape the whole movie. I don't think I've seen that done before, maybe except in a Chuck Norris movie. The cutting of the movie looked like the guy who did it, got drunk, fell asleep, and then when he woke up just cut the whole film into random strips and taped it together again. Besides I really never figured out what Dennis Hopper's character was named. I think I counted at least 4 different names. Last a sudden sunrise really nailed my feeling towards the whole movie, it sucked! All in all I would say the only good thing about this movie is that it only wasted 95 min of my life.

This is a production from the Nu Image/Millennium Pictures movie company, and if you have seen any of their other movies, you probably know that on a technical level the movie will succeed. Indeed, "Top Of The World" is a very good-looking movie. The cinematography is great, there are some great locations that will make you wonder how the filmmakers got permission to run amuck on, and there are some good action sequences.

Unfortunately, some key parts of the movie are definitely lacking. The characters could have been better written - as it is, there is no real character that interests you and makes you hope he or she will prevail. These poorly written characters may be why the acting is not always very enthusiastic by the once-in-a-lifetime cast. Also, the various plot twists and character backstabbings become confusing after a while.

Not a terrible movie, but it's kind of lacking. I would only recommend you watch it if nothing else better is playing on TV.