Every so often, LVA gets a press release that deserves to be mocked. This is one of those times. In order to promote Gr88.com, the creators of the site have deigned to release a list of “Poker Films of All Times [sic].” For starters, any list which spells the most famous poker film ever made as “The Cincinatti [sic] Kid” deserves a spanking. To rank that movie only #3 adds insult to injury. Here’s the somewhat dubious list cobbled together by the great minds at Gr88.com:
1. Rounders
2. Maverick (as in Mel “I hate Jews” Gibson, not the classic James Garner series)
4. Casino (in which no poker is played, to my recollection)
5. Ocean’s Eleven (Gr88.com chooses the George Clooney version over the Frank Sinatra one — your mileage may vary)
6. Casino Royale (the Daniel Craig remake, which dumbs down the game of choice from baccarat to Texas Hold ‘Em)
7. The Sting
That’s the best they could do? Surely there are good poker-centric films that were omitted. Any suggestions?
The Odd Couple
The poker scene in the early part of House of Games is great. I even noticed how they get you wondering what is going on in that back room and then gradually show you more of what is going on before taking you into the room.
Jesus, How could they leave out “A Big Hand for The Little Lady” with Henry Fonda, Joanne Woodward, Jason Robards.
Must be because the website gurus are too young to even know about a movie made in 1966.
Ziggy
What I want to know is how could *I* have forgotten it? I’ve seen “Big Hand” so many times I’ve lost count.
“6. Casino Royale (the Daniel Craig remake, which dumbs down the game of choice from baccarat to Texas Hold ‘Em)”
In the original CR, Sean Connery’s Bond is shown winning at baccarat in a smooth, sophisticated manner as if he’s this great gambler. Anybody who knows gambling can tell you that baccarat is like flipping a coin, it requires no skill at all, just luck. Hold’em, however, is definetly a game of skill, which is why top players make mjillions and there are hours of poker games on TV every week. Haven’t seen any baccarat tournaments on TV, have you? And that’s exactly why the new CR featured a realistic game of Hold’em, not chemin-de-fer. Dumbed down, eh?
“The Grand” with Woody Harrelson, poker tournament includes The Golden Nugget and the Plaza downtown Vegas casinos.
In the original”Casino Royale,” Sean Connery’s Bond is NOT “shown winning at baccarat” or anything else “in a smooth, sophisticated manner” for the simple reason that Connery is not *in* the movie. The ’67 “Casino Royale” falls outside of the Broccoli/Saltzman 007 film canon for the simple reason they didn’t own the rights at that time.
Hence, Columbia Pictures filmed “Casino Royale” as a comic pastiche, featuring multiple directors and multiple James Bonds (including David Niven and Peter Sellers). There was an even earlier CBS-TV version starring Barry Nelson (the first actor to play 007) but why belabor the point?
As to whether the switch of game in the 2006 “Casino Royale” merely happened to coincide with the upsurge in the popularity of poker or was directly influenced by it, I’m sure everyone has their own opinion. Since the previous 007 movies treated baccarat as an unexplained, virtually occult ritual that Bond always won because of his Jedi mind powers or whatever, I strongly suspect the ’06 “Casino Royale” wanted the central game to be one large numbers of viewers readily understood.
For a quick and entertaining primer on baccarat, I recommend the “Mission: Impossible” first-season episode “Odds on Evil,” which features a climactic baccarat showdown versus the villain of the week and Martin Landau’s Rollin Hand.
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