Shade - Nos Bastidores do Jogo

As movies about card games and/or con artists go, "Shade" is no "House Of Games" or "Nine Queens", but it's better than you might expect for a film that was barely released theatrically. The first two twists caught me completely off-guard (the final twist though....I saw it coming a few seconds before it happened). The poker scenes are highly entertaining (where can I get one of those "juiced" decks?). There are many good performances (Townsend, Foxx, Byrne), and nice turns by veterans (Hal Holbrook, Bo Hopkins). The weak links are Stallone and Melanie Griffith, who look awful in this film. Stallone's performance isn't bad, but they could easily have replaced him with an actor more appropriate for this role; Griffith IS bad, and it's hard to know what she's even doing in the picture. An actor who stands out (in a good way) is Roger G. Smith as Marlo, the mob enforcer with the extremely calm voice. (**1/2)

Well this movie really impressed me with its mix of poker hustling and mystery suspense. Although it was obvious that there was twists to be seen after just 30mins when the 1st one is realised it isn't a movie you can predict and to its credit it isn't a movie that you want to predict it has it all sexy ladies, handsome men, suspense and mystery (with a few suprises thrown in for good measure) Stallone is maybe a little "boring" in his role but he still brings a certain amount of screen presance with his introduction. What is really strange is that the 2 main names in the movie don't even enter it till about 1 hour in a very bold move by the director which works very well. All in all i loved this movie Watch it and enjoy it!

Shade is a great movie if you like the genre. I can imagine that if you are not acquainted with poker games(or playing cards) you'll not like this movie and think it's bad acting.

This movie is about a mechanic: Vernon.

Other movies like, The Sting, The Cincinnati Kid, Rounders, also have mechanics in it, but not playing the leading role.

The director of this movie is also a magician. So some elements of that will play a part in the movie. Think about The Magic Castle.

The story reads that a young mechanic (Vernon) starts working together(again) with 2 other con men. That goes well in the beginning but later on a little "obstacle" get's in their way.

For me, this is one of the best(maybe the best) movies about hustling. I like the characters, and I like the names.

I like Stallone also in this movie. First I though it would be a bit of a let down. But he acts great in this picture. Stallone plays the part of "Dad(dy) Stevens"(Old Stevens). A real legend, who was maybe the best hustler of all time. You could shuffle a deck, give it to Stevens, and he could shuffle you the three desired cards to the top of the deck in three riffle shuffle actions. I can guess what you're thinking: If he could shuffle three desired cards to the top of the deck, why not four ? "Are you nuts! They kill you by four" Stevens would reply.

To me , a great movie, get's better and better every time I watch it over and over again.

Also the intro is really cool. An old scene of people playing cards with the young Stevens, who get's busted by palming a card while some mugger tells him to put his hands in the air. A gun fight begins, ...and then the demonstration of bottom dealing, push-through shuffling, revelations begins. With a very nice shade sound at the back ground.

Also I read a bit of the other posts.

About the names: The names are just for fun. The characters do no represent the real named magicians. However, I don't think most people will recognize a magician named Andrews. Andrews was also a magician/gambler but he is better know as the author S.W. Erdnase of the book "Expert at the Card Table".

Funny easter eggs are in the movie. Like indeed the names, the room 808 (were the poker games is played with the Dean) 808 is the number of Bicycle playing cards. The poker scene with Dean and Vernon (form the Cincinnati kid)

About the juiced deck. A juiced deck is a marked deck. This is a real deck. But, not like in the movie. Most of the times when you play with a juiced deck, you will not mark the cards like you actually see their indices. (For example, the 8 in the movie). Also that the other 2 could read it that fast is not believable. It's takes hours of practice to accomplish this with your eyes. Juiced is by far, the best marked deck out there. The fluid (the juice ;-) is for purchase. But still, one needs to know how to mark his deck ;-)

Stallone also says at the end that he could buy Vernon out. That is also impossible, regarding the fact that one cannot raise himself.

Tom.

I work at Blockbuster so it's fair to say I have seen my fair share of movies and to be honest in the last 3 years...nothing has really caught my eye and made me sit and enjoy watching the same movie over and over again.

One thing I notice to is we get a lot of 'sleepers' or straight to DVD titles and often those are the better of the movies. Shade was one of them, this movie had an excellent story, great acting and was just fun to watch, when I saw it I wanted to own it, although it cost me $30 Canadian it was worth it. Stallone, although not well liked or viewed as a good actor by public opinion, I beg to differ. Rock, Cop Land, Shade were all excellent movies, he was good in the remake of Get Carter as well. Stuart Townsend also is an up and coming actor. It's a shame a well made movie like this didn't go to theaters.

It is movies like Shade and Poolhall Junkies that I can sit down and enjoy watching, forget sitting and watching the Pitch Black's, the Torque's and all those other overhyped movies, give me the sleepers anyday!

Sometimes I look at movies in terms of expectations and judge accordingly. Like 21 Grams, high expectations...and fell short. Shade, a straight to video/DVD with Stallone, mediocre at best expectations. This movie exceeded my expectations and in fact, I'd be more likely to recommend it as a rental then 21 grams. I was certainly entertained and thankfully Stallone, unlike some other straight to DVD releases, is NOT the star.

What was also unusual, was the fact that I didn't pick up on all the plot twists and they were plausible plot twists which made me feel like an actual story had been played out instead of left wondering, "where the hell did that come from"?

Better then average movie and way better then average straight to DVD. Certainly worth renting. Enjoy. If nothing else, the opening and closing credits show the viewer some very impressive slight of hand and how it's done by card sharks.