Molly's Game (2018)

You may not have heard of her before this film but Molly Bloom but her story is pretty damn cinematic. Olympic skier has a tough fall, taken out of the sport and decides to take a gap year before going to law school and stumbled her way into an exclusive poker club. She ends up being a total queen and running her own million dollar poker night in multiple locations in America, not without problems like Russian mafia and the FBI. Sounds sick right? Well she wrote a book and now we have this baby in the cinemas. 

I can't believe I went that long without talking about Jessica Chastain. She is outstanding in this. And the more I think about her the more I think she is a fantastic actor all round. She's been in some great stuff and made some great creative choices. Loved her in The Help (2011) as well as Interstellar (2014) and The Martian (2015). (And look out for Painkiller Jane she will be perfect). The film is narrated by Bloom, and Chastain captures that well, she engages with the audience immediately and maintains that. Will say quickly as well, the teenage version of her was also fantastic and really captured the character's tone the same as Chastain. Samantha Isler played a younger version of Bloom to a T and helped build her life up until when we find her. 

The direction was great, Aaron Sorkin, known for writing some bloody good stuff, The West Wing, A Few Good Men (1992) and The Social Network (2010) to name a few, knocks it out of the park with his directorial debut. Though I imagine he had a helping hand from Kevin Costner who played Bloom's father but also has experience in directing. Costner was great, believable amount of pushy vs supportive parent and brought a justifiable means to Blooms resentment. There is a great scene with Costner and Chastain in which they bounce off each other well which was quite touching.

Idris Elba OR SHOULD I SAID I-DISH ELBA. What a dish. Attractive man, attractive character. He plays Charlie Jaffey, Bloom's lawyer, father and purposely good and high in morals for a lawyer without being too preachy. His interactions with Chastian actually get a few laughs, there's some natural back and forths between them both quietly and with louder outbursts. Really the whole cast was pretty great. 

The poker team have a few different memorable characters, Michael Cera plays 'Player X' / a fictional self. A famous actor that plays poker as a means of pushing his power around more than his money. It's not confirmed who this actually is but it's interesting to think about the amount of powerful players in the early noughties that would throw their money around on the table. 

It was well shot, well edited with good sound mixing. I think though long I enjoyed the narrative choice and how we flipped between the present and the past. They integrated the past with the lessons learnt well and we were never rushed in between locations or times. The costumes we great, sometimes its hard to notice a time different when a film is set so recently, essentially the main noticeable difference is the mobile phones. They have buttons. The costumes and makeup were gorgeous, they drip with expense and risk as the underground poker games do. There's a slight grittiness to the game, the smoke and grumbles which make the games feel more validated. 

I haven't yet read the book, though now I intend to, so I can't say how good of an adaption it is but it is a great screenplay. Perfect choice of formatting for the story. Yes it is long but you honestly don't really notice. 7/10

CINEMATES - A