In the high-stakes poker match, Matt Damon is in a neck to neck battle with Teddy KGB (John Malkovich) in the final match of Texas Hold Them. In a desperate attempt to repay debts, Matt reluctantly borrows $10000 from one of his professors which he then uses to buy in to the game.
Given the prevailing attitude towards gambling and sports betting in the U.S, it seems strange to think that Hollywood loves nothing more than a suspenseful poker or casino scene. Interestingly, we have seen a huge number of casino and gambling scenes in a host of movies through the ages, while the diversity of films in which these take place has also evolved during the last 20 years.
Much of this has been inspired by the rise of online gaming, which has grown increasingly popular in developed economies in the UK and broken down many of the traditional barriers to gaming. Some online poker sites in the UK are all well-regulated and free-to-access, for example, introducing gaming as a staple feature of popular culture and popularising it among new player demographics in the process.
10 – Rounders
- I was nervous as hell the first I watched Mike (Matt Damon) sit down at the poker table against Teddy KGB (John Malkovich) in the final Texas Hold'em showdown. Acting out of desperation to repay Worm’s debts, Mike borrowed $10,000 from his old professor to buy in to the game.
- In 1946, a group of German POWs are mistakenly sent to a Soviet female transit prison camp and must cope with the hostility of the Soviet female inmates and guards, under the orders of cruel camp commander Pavlov.
- Synopsis After suffering a huge setback in a high-stakes poker game, Mike McDermott promises to lay down his cards for good, but when his best buddy gets in over his head with a ruthless underground club owner, Mike's loyalty draws him back to the tables in a game he cannot afford to lose.
This entire film centres on gambling, although it is the final scene featuring Matt Damon (Mike) and John Malkovich (Teddy KGB) that steals the show. As the two compete in a final, winner-take-all round of Texas Hold’em Poker, there is incredible tension and intensity that keeps the viewer engaged before the film finally arrives at the outcome that everyone wants! The scene is embellished by the fact that Mike had borrowed $10,000 from his old Professor in a bid to repay his friends’ debts, which adds an element of emotion too.
9 – Run Lola Run
This is a great and underrated film and one that also includes a genuinely enthralling (not to mention unusually uplifting) casino scene. This sees Lola in need of quick cash to save her boyfriend, so she approaches a roulette table and places all that she has on 20 black. Even though the odds are 1,296-1 to win, you just know that Lola is destined for a huge success!
8 – Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
In an age of instantly accessible, freeroll poker tournaments, the notion of smoke-filled backroom gameplay seems horribly outdated. There is something alluring about old-school poker, however, and this was captured perfectly during the Guy Ritchie hit Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. The stakes rise incredibly high during one (and unfortunately rigged) game of Three Card Brag between Fast Eddy (Nick Moran) and Hatchet Harry (P.H. Moriarty), with things getting hairy for the former as he needs to borrow money to stay in the game. This is worth watching for the darkness and menace that engulfs the scene alone.
John Malkovich Movies
7 – Ocean’s Eleven
Next, we consider a similar scene, as expert confidence trickster Brad Pitt teachers a small group of actors how to play poker. Filled with humour and witty dialogue this is one of the more engaging gambling scenes you will ever see while George Clooney’s cameo is eye-catching in the extreme. For anyone who has ever gone through the process of learning poker and its various iterations, this scene will tickle your funny bone!
6 – Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery
While Austin Powers may be considered the anti-Bond, Mike Myers knows how to star in a blackjack scene. In this film, the redoubtable Powers engages Number Two (Robert Wagner) in a hilarious game of blackjack, making light of the tension usually associated with gambling. The fact that the game is also being played wrong only adds to the sense of fun, as it takes a light-hearted glance at a usually serious topic!
5 – Tombstone
This list would not be complete without a Western film, as the Wild West of the U.S became the home of poker and gambling during the 19th century. Tombstone is our pick, featuring Val Kilmer in one of his very best roles as Doc Holiday and including a number of brilliant poker scenes. One, in particular, sees Doc liquored up and in good spirits after 36 consecutive hours of poker, throughout which he manages to maintain his sharp edge and emerge victoriously.
4 – Swingers
Memorable for the appearance of an incredibly young Vince Vaughn, Swingers sees a classic road-trip to Vegas and outstanding casino action throughout. Vaughn’s character Trent forces his friend Mike (Jon Favreau) to join him as he visits Vegas in a bid to end his financial woes. Watching Mike pretend to be a high-roller as he buys into a $100 minimum bet table with a $300 bet is worth the entry fee alone, and this is another film that successfully makes light of casino gameplay.
3 – Cool Hand Luke
When trying to justify the inclusion of this film on the list, I kept coming back to the fact that it has Paul Newman in it. Undoubtedly the coolest actor of his generation, Newman had one of the best poker faces of all time and he used this to perfection as the lead character in this title. He also wins for the line ‘Sometimes nothin’ can be a real cool hand’, which taps into the influence of bluffing as a key poker strategy.
2 – Hard Eight
This film is all about gambling, that high speed, high thrill, risk-taking scenario makes for a very fast-paced film that is well worth watching. While it is one for the older gamblers, young people will also like the class and style this move has.
1 – Goodfellas
This scene is fleeting and not connected to the main Goodfellas narrative, but is still manages to stand out thanks largely to the incredibly menacing and downright terrifying performance of Joe Pesci as everybody’s favourite lunatic Tommy DeVito. Before DeVito met a sticky end, he shoots a barman in the foot after an honest misunderstanding during a good-natured game of poker. He later kills the same man during a similar game, after the unfortunate ‘Spider’ engages Tommy in a brief and lethal bout of banter.
Rounders is easily one of the best poker film ever made, and the John Dahl picture is credited with being one of the catalysts that sparked the poker boom in the mid-2000s. Despite posting modest box office figures of $22.9 million domestically upon release in 1998, it later surged in popularity as more people became aware of Texas Hold’em. There have been constant calls for the dazzling cast which included John Malkovich and Matt Damon to reunite and make a sequel, but the Good Will Hunting star recently claimed that it will never come to fruition.
There has been a lot of speculation over what kind of plot Rounders 2 would take if it was made. With it being over twenty years since the original, a lot of things in the poker scene have changed. A new offering would have to take that into account. When Rounders was released, online poker was still in an embryonic form. But now it has grown into an industry of Godzilla-like proportions.
Matt Damon’s character was a university student who played in small poker games, but if a new film was to reflect the current state of affairs he would be playing tournaments and cash games at online poker sites like https://poker.paddypower.com/. While the games online are exciting, they leave little space for the character interaction which made the first film so intriguing.
Another idea for a premise for Rounders 2 was that Gretchen Mol’s character, Jo, decides to get revenge on Damon’s Mike McDermott. The two characters had been in a relationship in Rounders, and McDermott had promised his girlfriend he would quit poker to focus on law school. He broke the promise, though, and got back into the poker scene. This resulted in their breakup.
The bad news for poker fans who were hopeful of seeing what McDermott was up to nowadays is that Damon has recently claimed that Rounders 2 won’t be happening. It was already looking unlikely with the time gap since the first, but previously Damon and Dahl had said they would be interested in revisiting the characters.
Damon professed that it was impossible to release a niche film like Rounders in the modern age, as Hollywood executives want to create films which are going to appeal to as many people as possible. And the lack of a DVD market means that Rounders 2 would most likely be a flop.
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However, all hope should not be lost just yet. There may not be a DVD market anymore, but Netflix has shown that it is willing to churn out films about pretty much anything. Rounders 2 may not be worthy of a cinematic release, but it could easily be made for the streaming service.
Netflix has a lot of money to throw at projects, and has managed to recruit huge actors in the past including Will Smith and Sandra Bullock. The company could afford Damon, and simply having him on board may be enough to get viewers to watch the movie. Although the chances are slim, there may yet be a Rounders 2 release one day.