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Parker Pages: Blackjack Main
Welcome ... and some personal thoughts
Posted By: Don Schlesinger In Response To: Re: The time is here (John Chang)
Date: Saturday, 29 March 2008, at 9:28 a.m.
Hi, John. Welcome! Enjoyed reading your Web site and blog.
I saw the movie yesterday and have since discussed it with several friends. I'm sorry to say that, overall, I was disappointed. In addition, I'm even more sorry that all the reviews I read were rather poor.
As we all know, the book was a somewhat romanticized version of real-life and was, therefore, not entirely accurate. I don't know what it is with Hollywood screenplay writers who adapt written material that makes them want to trash the original book and simply embellish and rewrite until the movie bears virtually no resemblance to the source, but that seems to be the case here.
Still, I wonder if the public's reaction will be more favorable, given that a) they don't know the real story, and b) they aren't likely to be bothered by the myriad technical inaccuracies that were evident throughout. I'm not too optimistic about a boffo box office, but let's see what Monday's numbers bring.
Some things, of course, bothered me more than others. First, they chose to set the whole adventure in the modern day, instead of the actual time period. I'm sure that made it easier to film, but it gave a color to the story that you guys didn't actually experience.
Surely, walking through airports with $100,000 strapped to your body means something a little different today than it did 15-20 years ago! There wouldn't have been that lady TSA agent back then. And Biometrica and facial recognition software, that played a big role in the movie, was not, obviously, your concern in the 1980s or early '90s.
There were two technical aspects that bothered me the most (there were a lot more than two!). The first was the entirely gratuitous throw-away line, early on, when Kate mentions how BS tells you to always split aces and eights but that, in reality, splitting eights against a dealer ten or ace is "a sucker play." Why on earth would anyone feel obliged to create an idiotic line like that? What possible role could it have played in the movie to intentionally disseminate information that would make the player look like a moron to aficionados? Or, ... was it NOT intentional? Hmm.
Finally, the very essence of the entire Big Player methodology seemed tragically flawed in the movie portrayal. We all know that the BP role can be played two ways: 1) With a player who gets called in, but whose entire play (bets and strategy decisions) is "controlled" by the seated player, so that the BP can look away, pay no attention to the cards, not count at all, etc., or 2) With the seated spotter calling in the BP, passing the count to him, and then leaving the table! Why on earth, in the movie, would the spotter remain there, eating the good cards? Why would he/she be needed to stroke his/her hair to signal the BP to leave the table, when the BP is already counting himself?!
Obviously, we could go on, but to what avail. I'll simply state my personal opinion that I was disappointed with a great deal of the technical aspects but, in truth, even more disappointed with the movie as an artistic creation. It's a shame that they waited eight years, since the book was published, to get it to the screen and that they couldn't have created something more dynamic and appealing.
The professor to whom Ben applies for the scholarship told him to "dazzle." Someone should have passed along the same advice to the screenplay writer!
Thanks so much for dropping by. Do visit again, every now and then.
Regards,
Don
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