Casino and the Big Screen

Casinos, poker and blackjack have always inspired imagination of players, but also of artists and writers. Risk, big money changing hands in the course of one night and the image of rich and famous sitting by casino tables never failed to attract attention. Therefore it comes as no surprise that producers and film directors so often choose to bring gambling world to the big screen.

The list of casino movies is very long, from comedies and musicals through action movies to dark dramas. Similarly just a brief look at the names of directors shows that casinos are an inspiring topic for successful directors like Steven Soderbergh as well as such legends as Martin Scorsese.

Mysterious and dangerous liaisons between the world of casinos and mafia are without doubt one of the most fascinating motives to appear on the big screen. Movies like “Bugsy” or the famous “Casino” tell stories of real gangsters and the way they changed the face of the ultimate destination of all casino fans – Las Vegas. Both movies show the dangerous glamour of the city with money laundering, gangster wars and big money turning friends and lovers into enemies.

Casinos have always been a promised land for all wannabe millionaires. Numerous films tell stories of those who, using not always legal ways, aim to take their bite of big casino money. Some of them chose to put their skills to the test, sitting down to a poker table like Matt Damon’s Mike McDermott in “Rounders” or trying their luck counting cards in blackjack like Kevin Spacey’s Micky Rosa and his MIT students in the recent movie “21”. In other cases the characters don’t waste their time sitting at the table and instead choose to get straight to the point, which is of course the money.
In each film of the famous Ocean trilogy, Danny Ocean and his team of con artists come up with a sophisticated plan to their hands on big casino money and punish the bad guys who cross their path, all in the glittering glamour of The Strip.

This list goes on and with new titles coming to cinemas every year we can be always be sure to find some casino emotions on the big screen.