Rating of
3/4
The three hours will just fly by!
MovieAddict - wrote on 05/14/13
Casino tells the story of Sam 'Ace' Rothstein, a chain-smoking gambling perfectionist who is hired by the Chicago Mob to run the Tangiers Casino in Las Vegas. Joe Pesci co-stars as Rothstein's longtime friend Nicky Santoro, who is also sent to Vegas by the Chicago boys to keep the peace and protect Rothstein.
After a very successful start in Vegas, Rothstein courts and marries a beautiful hustler named Ginger McKenna (Sharon Stone). But her surreptitious ongoing relationship with sleazy ex-boyfriend Lester Diamond (James Woods) combined with her obsession with jewelry, expensive clothes, cars, drugs and consequently her indifference towards her own daughter pushes Sam to the outer limits of his endurance. Their deteriorating relationship threatens to sink the whole casino scam.
Sam's over-protectiveness of his own casino lands him in hot water with the gaming commission, and Nicky's own actions make him a target for the FBI. Nicky is a cold, calculated person who doesn't mind doing the dirty work and portrays the blood thirsty tough guy perfectly. Sharon Stone is alluring and plays the role of the drugged up wife very convincingly. We watch in horror as she goes from a straight up lovable hustler to a smoothly manipulative greedy cocaine-addled truly pathetic trophy wife.
Pretty much one of the greatest crime movie of all time! Scorsese directs this movie at full-speed, tearing open the rotten underside of Vegas in the 1970’s for all to see. It has the look and feel of "Goodfellas", but focuses less on the Mafia and more on one man's drive to get to the top and avoid the Feds (who at one point actually land on his lawn when their spying helicopter runs out of gas).
