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The Cooler (2003)
Director:
Wayne Kramer
Starring:
William H. Macy, Alec Baldwin, Maria Bello
Studio:
Lions Gate Films
For showtimes, head to Fandango.
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Wish I would have been in Vegas two years ago.
If I had, I would have headed directly to the sports book area of the first casino I saw - you know, the place where you can lay down a bet on who'll win the coin toss in the 2006 Super Bowl or how many times the Miami jai alai team will high five during their first three games of the 2004 season. Anyway, I would head right up to the window and I'd ask, "Excuse me sir, what are the odds that I'll end up getting an eyeful of William H. Macy's hairy scrotum in 2003?" And he'd say "3 million to one sir." And I'd say, "I'll put a ten spot on that one, mister."
Had I placed that bet so very long ago, I would be writing this piece from the warmer confines of my private cabana on a beach in Kihei, Maui, basking in the sunshine while ice cubes tinkled in my tumbler of vintage scotch. As it is, I'm reduced to typing away at a Wicker Park coffee shop, wondering why Wayne Kramer, director of new Lion's Gate release "The Cooler," felt so oddly compelled to expose such an unlikely, unseemly sight to viewers in his debut effort.
Don't get me wrong. There's really exactly nothing bad you can say about indie
journeyman William H. Macy. From playing the salesman in the Coen brothers' "Fargo" to
an unforgettable performance as "Quiz
Kid" Donny Smith in P.T. Andersen's "Magnolia" ("I have so much love to give…"),
Macy has mastered the art of saying more with one cracked smile than most in
the acting profession can express with reams full of dialogue.
In "The Cooler," Macy's work is no exception. Playing Bernie Lootz, a casino employee whose sole job is to pass on the bad luck he innately possesses, Macy projects a dead-on everyman sadsack glumness, drawing the viewer into an otherwise strangely uneven film.
"The Cooler" follows loser Lootz as he attempts to wind up his career as a gambling spoiler but keeps getting pulled back by ultraviolent casino boss Shellie Kaplow, played by Alec Baldwin, and love interest Natalie Belasario (Mario Bello).
With rare exceptions, the plot follows a predictable arc that goes a little something like this:
Bernie Lootz is glum. He spreads bad luck. There's no cream left in the creamer tin for his coffee. Lootz gets laid. He magically spreads good luck. There's plenty of cream for his coffee. The girl (Bello) leaves. Bad luck. Again, no cream. Girl comes back. Cream. Luck. After a while, you begin to wonder why the hell the bartender at the casino doesn't just fix the frickin' creamer problem, or at the very least change up her "look of shock and dismay bit." The film clocks in at a lengthy 2:30 hours, a good percentage of which features some pretty repetitive, predictable action.
Besides a bad case of predictability, the film suffers from a real lack of restraint.
Baldwin's ham-handed casino boss preaches an "old school Vegas" management style including garden-variety bad guy casino boss stuff like knee-capping and the use of moustachioed henchmen to fulfill his whims. In several cases the violence is unnecessarily extreme, like when we hear the bone snapping as Kaplow breaks Office Space star Ron Livingston's arm for threatening to take his job or when Lootz' love interest Natalie's head ricochets off the mirror after being smacked around.
In another scene, where Macy bares his aforementioned manhood, a perfectly interesting, funny sex scene is rendered highly unpalatable by the director's insistence on a closeup of Macy and Bellos' genitals. I mean, sensuality's one thing, but for Christ's sakes, do we really need to see the man's balls? There's nothing particularly innovative about either the brutality or the nudity, and a smidgen of subtlety on the part of writer Fran Hannah director Wayne Kramer would have improved the film immensely.
As it stands, "The Cooler" is a film worth seeing if only you're a real freak for Vegas genre films or looking to view the year's most unlikely on-screen appearance by an indie icon's nether regions.
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Written by Richard Sharp
Review Date: December 16, 2003
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