Directed by:
Aaron SorkinScreenplay:
Aaron SorkinCinematography:
Charlotte Bruus ChristensenComposer:
Daniel PembertonCast:
Jessica Chastain, Idris Elba, Kevin Costner, Michael Cera, Samantha Isler, Chris O'Dowd, Rachel Skarsten, Graham Greene, Claire Rankin, Bill Camp (more)VOD (4)
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Based on the true story of Molly Bloom, an Olympic-class skier who ran the world's most exclusive high-stakes poker game for a decade before being arrested in the middle of the night by 17 FBI agents wielding automatic weapons. Her players included Hollywood royalty, sports stars, business titans and finally, unbeknownst to her, the Russian mob. Her only ally was her criminal defense lawyer Charlie Jaffey, who learned that there was much more to Molly than the tabloids led us to believe. (STX Entertainment)
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Despite the presence of my favorite actress Jessica Chastain, positive reviews, and feedback, Molly's Game is a film that never captivated me for a single moment and mostly left me puzzled. It's not so much about Jessica's reliable performance as it is about the way the character is written. Secondly, in a short period of time, I felt like the creative team was trying to sell me a feminist drama about a strong woman facing societal pressure. For example, in the case of Happy Valley, that series felt much more convincing and I was able to identify with its protagonist and overlook the feminist tone. In Molly's Game, I perceived the character of Molly Bloom completely differently than Aaron Sorkin did. Not as a victim, but as a manipulative and ambitious bitch who ultimately overestimated her abilities and only with great luck managed to balance her collision with the American legal system. If the film worked with a character type like the one in There Will Be Blood, which is devoid of any idealization and sentimentality, I would take Molly's Game much more seriously. With this film, it seemed to me that despite all the effort to create a strong female character, the film sells costumes by top designers, the actress's physical attractiveness, and her perfect makeup, i.e., the Hollywood gloss. The film may be a problem even for those who don't care about poker, as there is a bit too much of it at the expense of the characters. I'll give it three stars because, despite all my reservations, Sorkin is talented and simply because of Jessica, but it's a very weak three stars. Overall impression: 50%.
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This time round, Sorkin served up his machine-gun screenplay himself and it must be said that it is Mr. Fincher’s school that had the greatest influence on his style. We jump gracefully in time, the cadence of information is textbook standard and the story doesn’t sacrifice intelligence to emotions. The actors take delight in each line and Pemberton’s music is excellent again. At last the girls have someone to look up to. Great. Table in Excel.
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The perfect Jessica Chastain in another of the roles she is good at - the role of a woman who goes after what she wants and most of the other characters serve as a rug on that journey. It is a pleasure to listen to the dialogues written by Aaron Sorkin, but he also managed to direct in such a way that I didn’t even notice that two and a quarter hours had passed. I can't fail to mention Idris Elba, who was Jessica Chastain's equal acting partner and acts as good as Morgan Freeman in his best form, Kevin Costner in a smaller but very important role, and also as always the perfect music of Daniel Pemberton.
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Just as watching a film from the normalization era doesn’t turn me into an avid communist, I don't become a seasoned criminal when watching stories about "heroes" from the underground world, so I can safely say that I really enjoyed the one hundred and forty minutes of gambling/money-laundering with Molly. The running time seemed terrifying, but unlike other similarly long films, it didn't bore me, and the plot was interesting from start to finish. A well deserved five stars.
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I will skip the traditional (and justified) criticisms of Sorkin's original monologue-dialog reclamation style, because you either love it or hate it. And the same could be said about this movie. Moreover, Sorkin even highlights his strength (or weakness as you wish). And as a result the aspects that the better directors adapting his material in the past always tent to hide somehow, is even more noticeable here. Anyway, there´s still a lot to be unhappy about. It 's longer than it should be, there' s a lot of stylized passages à la The Big Short with dialogs, which are directed like in a theater. Molly comes out of it too positively (it 's too genteel), her personal life is omitted (which would have been fine if it had not been too obvious that´s essential ) and it lacks a proper ending. Which is related to the fact that it may have come about with too little distance from those events, in other words, not everything is / can be / wants to be said. But at the same time, it is true that Molly's destiny is so captivating and stimulating that it would manage to handle even a significantly worse movie than the one made. In addition, Jessica and Idris are Sorkin's refined replicas and they both obviously enjoy it a lot. And myself as well.
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