When I hear the words Atlantic City, I used to think of the Bruce Springsteen song. Then I might have remembered that it's an actual place and only after that something about it being a movie, starring Susan Sarandon and lemons. I decided to try and change the order of things a bit last week and actually watch the movie.
However, I was ready to turn it off after the first 10 minutes. That's because, with its ambient music and high number of characters, I was reminded of Nashville. Now there's a movie I'll admit intellectually is a great film, but never want to watch ever again. However, I soldiered on and found that those seemingly disparate characters end up collecting together in a story that's more of a traditional narrative than the sprawling Nashville. Also, the movie has in Burt Lancaster something Nashville doesn't: someone who can deliver an amazing, magnetic, movie-driving performance. Sorry, Lily Tomlin.
He plays Lou, who acts like he was a big-time gangster back in the day, but who just seems like a petty criminal with a chivalry problem. He lives in a rundown hotel that will probably be torn down for a new casino, along with the aging beauty queen he tends to and Sally, Susan Sarandon's wannabe dealer and oyster bar waitress. Soon, Sally's husband and spacey sister show up, with her sister knocked up and her husband packing stolen drugs. After that, the characters all try to make it, hoping to use the drugs as a shortcut.
The husband wants to sell the drugs to make some money, while Lou wants to sell them to take care of and impress Sally. He watches her cut lemons and rub them on her body after work. She just wants to get the oyster smell off while he seems to be having a half-religious and half-sexual vision of organic renewal.
That's the tension, even more so than the question of whether they'll be caught and rubbed out, that drives the rest of the movie. Sally is practical, she wants to do things and improve herself in very objective, financial terms. Lou is a dreamer and wants to recapture that lawless past he never really had. Naturally, things go sour, but since Lou's beauty queen is also living in the past - essentially, her gloriously set-decorated, frilly apartment- things go a little sweet as well. It might not be the cleanest, happiest movie you will ever see, it's certainly not the very best, but it's good enough.
1 comment:
Post a Comment