There was a good 3 years from about ‘05-‘08 where I would religiously watch the World Series of Poker. I didn’t think that watching other people play a card game would be exciting, but the ups and downs that come between the flop and the river was more of a roller coaster ride than expected. That’s the same feeling you will get when you watch Jessica Chastain and Idris Elba in Molly’s Game.
Molly’s Game follows the true story of “The Poker Princess” Molly Bloom (Chastain). After a horrific downhill freestyle ski accident at an Olympic qualifying event, Molly decides to move from Colorado to Los Angeles to figure out what to do with her life. She finds her way into the world of underground, high-stakes poker, and builds a multi-million dollar poker business for a decade until the FBI seizes all of her assets and arrests her for her "connections" to the Russian mob. She seeks the help of lawyer Charlie Jaffey (Elba), who believes her to be nothing more than what the tabloids presented her to be for years.
From minute one, the dialogue and narration goes 100 miles an hour. I didn't know who directed the film, so I sat in the theater thinking “hmm, this is either an Aaron Sorkin film, or someone did a hell of a job mimicking his style”. Then the end credits came along and lo and behold “written and directed by Aaron Sorkin”. If you have ever watched the show The Newsroom or the movie The Social Network, you know how fast your brain has to move to keep up with some of the rapid-fire conversations. There were definitely some lines that went over my head, but it was this vacillating style that carries the movie. It creates intriguing relationships between Molly and all the different characters she interacts with: well-known movie stars, wealthy diplomats, bored wall street moguls, and powerful (or seemingly powerful) men looking to spend, make, and eventually lose $100,000 at the flip of a card.
The movie cuts back and forth from her present legal battles to her of decade of building her exclusive games. Usually, this breaking up of stories and plot lines makes the audience prefer one timeline over the other. But both timelines are equally exciting. The years of anecdotes played out with the different personalities Bloom met over the years take the audience on the highs of winning a huge pot on the river (the last card dealt) and the lows of losing over $1 million in a night. This polarizing affect is magnified by Bloom’s interactions with supporting characters like the slick, thrill-seeking actor played by Michael Cera and the endearing drunk played by Chris O’Dowd. But none of those match the tennis-game like intensity between Chastain and Elba . Their chemistry as reluctant lawyer and stubborn client palpitates with tension, apprehension, and an underlying current of respect that occurs between two people who are at odds about a very important decision. Plus, Elba delivers one of the most impactful speeches of his career in defense of Chastain’s character. It rivals that of Pullman in Independence Day and Denzel in Training Day.
But it is Chastain that is the star of this movie. She is intense and focused from the second you hear her voice. She steals your attention with every word being a calculated move to keep her wits amongst men who believe themselves to better and more important. She brilliantly weaves intelligence and loquaciousness to navigate every sexual pass and legal hurdle in order to keep her high-stakes game afloat. She is as charming as her lawyer who states that her game is “kind of” legal as long as she avoids “breaking the law while breaking the law”. She grabs hold of every scene and situation, simultaneously showcasing a discipline and vulnerability that makes her someone you would trust with $500,000 of your money every week.
Bloom’s story is one of struggle and triumph in a world controlled by egos, misogyny, and power hungry men. Molly’s Game does a fabulous job of showing how women are definitely the more intelligent species and would run the world more efficiently and with cooler heads if it wasn’t for weak-minded men and their privilege. Well, at least it did until the end. The one downfall of this movie comes in the fact that for the first 2 hours of the movie, the audience is rooting for Molly’s independent rise to success without male influence. Then, one scene comes along and derails that by making it seem as if Molly’s impetus came from just one thing: in the words of the great philosopher Barney Stinson, “daddy issues”.
This one scene slightly dampens Chastain’s motivations and actions, but luckily does not completely upend the overall quality of her character or the movie. Molly’s Game is an edge-of-your-seat thrill ride without having any action scenes, gun shots, or car chases. Its characters are intriguing and its dialogue is a flourish of wit. I give Molly’s Game 8/10 Aces full of Kings.