Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets

How do I even begin to write this review? Just wanted to chime in and say this off beat film is about a bar in Las Vegas closing down. The whole film focusses on patrons to the bars - alcoholics, middle aged people, unhappy people, people complaining about their lives, what could have been - all well behaved despite their fragile undercurrent. Loved, loved it.

The movie and dive into the lives of these bar flies is fantastic! I love the story and watching people who love their neighborhood watering hole. However, this does not take place in Las Vegas. This bar has never existed in Las Vegas. There are a few pickup shots from the city, but everything else is filmed in Louisiana. As a Las Vegan born and raised, it took this movie from an 8 to a 5 very quickly. It's disappointing seeing a film try and fail so hard to capture what Las Vegas is really like.

I recommend it for the human side. Attempting to set it in Las Vegas takes away more than it adds once you see it's not a Vegas Bar.

They described it here as a feelgood film. It is not.

I found this film very believable and as a former bartender I know many people who could have been characters in a place like this. The film builds slowly in mosaic fashion and creates a multi-dimensional depiction of a so called "third place" that has real value in our increasingly corporate homogenized world. I really liked the film.

I was initially kinda angry when I found out this wasn't a real documentary. I had this weird emotional dump. It's hard to describe but I felt cheated in a way.

Thankfully though it also works as a regular narrative film, so I've gotten past them feelings and tried judging it based on that. A fictional film with mostly non-actors. And by them standards, it's still very very good. One of the best of the year actually. Which kinda begs the question, why did they even feel the need to try to sell it as a doc in the first place?