by GOODFELLAS (1990). That’s the mafia film next to the GODFATHER-series everyone is always talking about. But despite its style and great camera work by Michael Ballhaus, GOODFELLAS just feels like a film that wants much more than it could possibly delivery. It goes without saying that, obviously, it accomplished that with many viewers. But the truth is, Martin Scorsese could do better than GOODFELLAS. The truth is, what GOODFELLAS should’ve been was done five years later. CASINO. That’s GOODFELLAS the way it should’ve been. Certainly not the ugly little sister it is at some times seen as. Why? Well, there’s more than just one reason why all honors still going to GOODFELLAS should be handed over straight to its successor.
CASINO marks one of the most seasoned collaborations between Martin Scorsese and Robert DeNiro, following an idea they developed while making GOODFELLAS back in 1990. Scorsese wrote the screenplay together with Nicholas Pileggi, based on the latter’s non-fiction book CASINO: LOVE AND HONOR IN LAS VEGAS that also came out in 95. Even though Las Vegas had already become the epitome of fun, entertainment and gambling in America at the time, original material on “Sin City” hadn’t been available in abundance. It is fascinating how this town that wasn’t much more than a wide spot in the road back in the 40s, being a temporary home to journalists covering the atomic bomb tests nearby, had turned into a world of its own. A place that hadn’t been there, at least in Western culture, where you could go for a weekend and behave any way you wanted, ostensibly without consequences. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, the principle had become self-evident. But what lay behind all this? How does this system work. And who runs it? The film’s premise already is more intriguing than GOODFELLAS’.
The picture centers on three vital characters. Robert DeNiro as Sam “Ace” Rothstein, a minor mobsters sent down from Chicago to oversee the fictional Tangiers Casino on behalf of the old bosses. Joe Pesci as Nick Santoro, the typical street-wise thug and fixer that couldn’t do anything else than smash unwanted faces for the bosses because it simply isn’t in his repertoire. And there’s Sharon Stone as Ginger McKenna, a hooker turned classy, love interest to Ace and pretty much any other man in Vegas that ever lay his eyes upon her – but a conflicted woman caught somewhere between the possibilities her looks offer and the past as street hooker she just can’t leave behind. They’re flawed characters. And no attempt is made at depicting them any other way. What we see is their rise to the skies up from nothing, followed with their inevitable downfall flushing them out right where they started.
In the casino, the cardinal rule is to keep them playing and keep them coming back. The longer they play, the more they lose. In the end, we get it all.
Ace Rothstein
It is more than just intriguing how Scorsese presents to the unsuspecting viewer the mechanisms of organized crime that provided the backbone to Las Vegas’ entertainment industry. How these street-wise gangsters use every loophole in Nevada’s laws to their own benefit and rise higher than they could ever have dreamed back in Chicago. Chicago apparently learned a lesson or two from bringing down Al Capone on a charge for – you guessed it – tax evasion instead of alcohol trafficking, sale and murder. Las Vegas, by stark contrast, and Nevada’s laws, are a playground for people like Ace, knowing every little trick there is. Everything they do is presented and commented with fitting voice-overs. This is a stylistic device sometimes referred to as “lazy film writing” when it actually creates a very fascinating atmosphere, if done right. Scorsese used this stylistic device before in his masterpiece TAXI DRIVER (1976), if very differently. What we hear in CASINO are the thoughts of shrewd people, not the internal monologue of a psychopath. Knowing Scorsese’s early attempts at making atmospherical films like that, or even mob-themed material like MEAN STREETS (1973), you instantly know the freshness of CASINO. Especially when comparing it to the inevitable GOODFELLAS. CASINO is slick and polished. Just like its characters are slick and polished when, in reality, they’re far from that. Scorsese looks past the fronts of the hotels and casinos, showing his viewers the ugliness behind all the glamour, the bright lights and big money. By doing this, he creates a certain distance between discourse and characters. Something that got lost along the way in GOODFELLAS, which, at a certain time, predominantly concerns itself with Ray Liotta’s character.
And not only Ace is an interesting character. Nicky and his gang of blockheads add a lot of fun to the story. The short-fuzed bully fails and pays the ultimate price because he can’t adapt to some new environment. What he essentially does is play his game in the same manner as he did in Chicago. Ace is more clever, if only to a certain extent. Because Ace doesn’t know when to stop. He fails to realize the point where he’s won. His constant chase of fame and status only puts him in the spotlight, drawing attention from cops and other upholders of decency in Vegas, but also from the bosses in Chicago (or was it Kansas City?). Add to that his dysfunctional relationship with Ginger and you understand Ace is going down a desert road that eventually ends in a dead end, even though the dead end isn’t a shallow grave but San Diego. It’s everyone’s personal decision whether or not that is preferable. Ginger re-invented herself as femme fatale. But only to disguise the heartbroken hooker that found a savior/father figure in her former hustler, Lester Diamond ( James Woods). Lester is a sleazy son of a gun, at the same time Ginger is and will always be at a disadvantage against him. It is sad and self-destructive how she is running away from herself but only running in circles. She fails as well. Because she never realizes when she’s won. And because there’s no way she could change what she used to be. Or learn a lesson or two about moral, true love or gratefulness. In the end, those that win are the bosses back home, never really lifting a finger.
What we see in CASINO is, despite being at sometimes repetitive, the ugly, sick side of Las Vegas. A city run by outsiders that suck it dry like vampires until the wheels come off. But it’s entertaining and skillfully shot. So we never get bored during this journey down into Sin City’s underbelly. It also doesn’t feel as serious as GOODFELLAS, something that can definitely be seen as asset. CASINO is longer than GOODFELLAS, it is harder to relate with the characters, if more rewarding, and while it’s as repetitive, it’s still more fun. Or in other words, the superior film. DeNiro’s ludicrous suits stand testament to that. Maybe it’s not as deep a film as TAXI DRIVER. But CASINO is right up there with the best gangster/mafia films ever made.
