Coffee's For Closers: Glengarry Glen Ross (1992)

If I were ever in a situation to lecture on effective narrative cinema, I would certainly push the necessity of dialogue.  Now dialogue can be minimal but still manage to be effective as is the case in films like 2001: A Space Odyssey or the recent film Drive.  However, other films flourish with a presence of seemingly unending dialogue.  This is clearly the case with Glengarry Glen Ross, a film directed by James Foley based on an adaptation of prolific playwright David Mamet.  The words uttered in this film are masterfully precise and poetic, only to be made all the more miraculous by the ensemble cast, which includes a combination of veteran Hollywood actors, and young actors who were only beginning to make names for themselves as Hollywood icons.  It is not particularly cinematic in its portrayal, but the way each actor possesses his space, particularly Jack Lemmon, causes the movie to seem brilliantly shot, despite it being rather stagnant in its composition.  In fact, the only clear problem within the film is the heavy male centric composition of the film.  It is no surprise that the film is completely void of a single female actress, but the reality of Glengarry Glen Ross is that the world portrayed is that of male power and presence, and it possesses an underlying commentary of the frail state of such social structures.

Glengarry Glen Ross focuses on a group of aging salesmen who are attempting to maintain relevance in a business that no longer welcomes their antiquated methods.  The group includes a variety of men, the endearingly friendly, yet sharkishly sly Shelley Levine (Jack Lemmon), the parrot-like follower George Aaronow (Alan Arkin), the angsty rebel Dave Moss (Ed Harris), and the suave yet troubled Ricky Roma (Al Pacino).  The crew seems fine to drift through their jobs making just enough to get by, until they are approached by a young, acidic salesmen named Blake (Alec Baldwin) who berates the crew and dismisses their old ways explaining that they must get their act together or become unemployed.  The only beneficial outcome is that whoever in the group claims the most sales will receive a Corvette.  This announcement, solidified by their manager John Williamson (Kevin Spacey) leads the group into a flurry of misappropriated attempts at sales and emerging dishonesty between a previously close group of friends.  The only individual who seems to be fairing well in the entire deal is Ricky who assures deals by taken advantage of drunken men willing to make risky business deals.  Shelley becomes completely baffled by the process and attempts to use his old bag of tricks to little success.  Dave and George react differently and hatch a robbery plot, which will assure them access to the much coveted lead cards which will almost assure their victory and subsequent employment.  After a single night of attempted sales, Shelley returns to an office, which is full of detectives and an angry John who becomes the point of degradation for the crew who hold him responsible for the robbery.  While it is clear that George is to blame, he acts innocent, while Shelley brags about a miracle sale he made the night prior.  In a moment of pride, he foolishly takes blame for the robbery only to have John explain that his sale was null and void, as it was enacted with two clinically insane individuals.  John mocks and derides Shelley and takes pride in putting him in police custody for actions he was not guilty.  Befuddled and enraged Shelley is left at a worse place than the films opening, while Ricky scrambles to save his most recent sale.  George confused by his stroke of luck simply returns to his job as though the entire nights events never occurred.  In the simplest sense, it is a film about individual desires and how such actions completely destroy the possibility of societal cohabitation.

As mentioned in the introduction, the films is entirely male.  With the exception of an occasional woman's voice over the phone it is all male actors concerned about things only existing within the male world.  The characters only desire to engage with other men and make it quite clear that anything involving women is tragically irrelevant.  With just this description alone, it is easy to read the film as a misogynist text that relegates women to the private sphere and as an object without a voice.  However, the film is something far greater than this and actually focuses with great detail on the problems of unrestrained patriarchy.  The characters begin on and slow decline and only crash into a more tragic end, because their power has never been question in a sense of masculinity.  While the characters are clearly degraded from a class and age perspective this seems to affect them very little.  It is only when Blake yells at them and questions their masculinity that they seem to become bothered.  It is at this point that the entire crew, but George and Dave particularly, become adamant on assuring Blake that he cannot treat people in such a manner.  Their rebellion is of course illogical given that the desire to steal a stack of cards to sell for quick cash, when it is apparent that if they were to earn them in a respective manner their profits would increase considerably.  Even the award is masculine, as opposed to a raise or honorary praise, the group is offered a muscle car, which has little value aside from bragging rights.  Mamet's work is clearly about the problems of male competition becoming horrifically unchecked.  The film reflects this ideology and drives it to its most extreme, and the excellent cast solidifies it with each look of despair and confusion as their lives fall into complete chaos.

Glengarry Glen Ross is a contemporary classic and an excellent narrative film.  It is well worth watching for each monologue and diatribe and is a perfect example of how one should transfer theater to film.  It is a must own, although a regular DVD will do just fine.

Recorded At A Subsonic Level Is A Mantra, Lose...Lose...Lose: The Cooler (2003)

2003's The Cooler had all the makings to be an incredibly popular film, whether it be the quotable dialogue, the lavish scenery of Las Vegas or the excellent acting of both William H. Macy and Alec Baldwin.  Yet, when it comes down to it the film simply does not deliver what one would expect to be an extraordinary film.  The Cooler is great in its own right, but fore a multitude of reasons everything appears contrived and forced, making its watchability decrease considerably, not to mention the original cut of the film was reedited due to demands by the MPAA, which felt the films depictions of sexuality to be far too graphic.  Ultimately, The Cooler becomes a run of the mill Las Vegas story that the viewer will recognize through the other gambling movies of days gone by and the scenery that is so familiar to filmic and cultural history that even though it is cleverly executed and well spaced still seems like nothing more than b-roll footage from a travel channel expose on casinos.  Perhaps, the best word to describe a film like The Cooler is, despite masking itself in what should be a stellar film, average.

The film centers on Bernie Lootz (William H. Macy) a down-and-out cooler for the Shangri-La casino.  Bernie, who is apparently the unluckiest man alive, serves as their financial control by passing his luck on to players winning big at the casino partially as a means to make money, as well as a way to pay back past debts to the casino's owner Shelly Kaplow (Alec Baldwin) who broke Bernie's knee in a fit of rage only to offer him a job as a means to assure a financial return.  Bernie, finally free of his debts, explains to Shelly that he is leaving the city for something new and no longer desires to work as the casinos cooler.  This news upsets Shelly, as it comes simultaneously, the introduction of a group of men demanding that Shelly change his casino tactics to reflect modern times, as opposed to his mafialike tactics.  As a result, Shelly hires one of the casinos drink girls Natalie (Maria Bello) to feign interest in Bernie in order to give him a reason to stay in the city.  Initially, Bernie is confused by the advances and assumes he is being tricked, however, when Natalie continues to pursue him, he invites her into his world.  Natalie, easily wins Bernie over with her sultry ways and unyielding advances, but much to Natalie's surprise Bernie's good nature and honesty begin to take hold of her.  The two fall madly in love and all appears fine, until it becomes apparent that Bernie's recent luck with Natalie is affecting his job as a cooler.  Enraged, Shelly takes it upon himself to break the couple apart, however, no amount of physical punishment or ill-will can separate the couple and after some confrontation they come close to leaving.  Unfortunately, due to some other bad decisions and an attempt to protect his punk son, Bernie accrues a larger debt making it impossible to leave without Shelly following.  In one last hurrah, Bernie tries his hand at craps, betting eighty thousand dollars on a single game.  His luck having changed allows him to win and he is able to leave the casino debt free and in possession of a substantial amount of cash.  Shelly is left to face his fading empire with rather fatal results.

The Cooler, while not an incredibly meaningful movie, does have one thing going for it.  The film is an excellent example of game theory as it concerns film criticism.  I will attempt to elaborate on game theory here a bit, but Fredrik on Film provided a far more substantial bit a few months back, concerning the theory.  In essence, game theory posits that life as it exists is a series of games in which rational people engage one another in outcomes in which they will either win or lose with an assumption that the net amount will result in equilibrium.   This excludes, however, those who are adapted to play certain "games" better or have disadvantages that will assure their constant loss at a game.  These two sides of the coin are represented in this film through Shelly and Bernie respectively.  Shelly is a hardheaded businessman who has a set of methods that appear to work for him in the long run, whether it be his brutal means of dealing with cheaters or his clinging to archaic means of casino running with the promise that the customers will be loyal.  He knows how to win the games he engages in, yet as the film proves, he is due for a loss and the equillibrium hits Shelly heavily given that the odds had for a considerable time been in his favor.  The same works for Bernie although his case is the opposite, it appears as though nothing that Bernie engages in is fruitful, yet with time and the help of other rational game players, such as Natalie, Bernie is able to accrue a few wins and help out his equilibrium.  One could look at game theory as a rationalized version of karma, except that good or bad deeds have nothing to do with out come, but that a person is destined to an average number of wins and losses over their lifespan, regardless of their ethical engagement in said life.  The Cooler, as well as many film noir masterpieces, provide the most fruitful examples of the game theory as it relates to film.

The Cooler is an enjoyable film, it will not blow you away with excellence, yet it is not a burden to watch.  This is a straight-out rental movie and one of many concerning the brutal, Darwin fueled world of Las Vegas.