While this is not a "great", as were a number of Clark Gable classics, it is a very solid and very good film that is well worth watching.
It would have been easy to simply tell the story of a small-time gambling casino, and to paint some of the patrons as pathetic losers at life. But this film goes beyond all that and tells its story from various perspectives.
For example, the owner of a casino (Gable)...but also a family man who is having problems with his son because the son disapproves of the gambling aspect of his father's life. The owner of the casino also has a serious heart condition, and he needs one thing to thrive -- retirement. The scenes with the son (Darryl Hickman, who is excellent) and wife (Alexis Smith, also excellent) are sentimental, but well done, and flesh out Gable's character more than one might expect from reading the blurb about the film.
While Gable is the star here, and the focus of the film, there's a wonderful parade of performances by terrific character actors to round out the film:
Lewis Stone is a down-and-out gambler...definitely quite a long ways from his days as Andy Hardy's father. He plays it superbly.
Mary Astor as the almost-other love of Gable.
Marjorie Rambeau as a high society lover of poker and a force of nature.
And, one of Gable's frequent costars -- Frank Morgan, although here Morgan is not quite so likable, but does very nicely as the opponent.
Not all of Gable's post-war films were gems, but this one is. And I know that because I don't like gambling, don't gamble, and don't understand gambling. But this film held my rapt attention. Highly recommended.
It would have been easy to simply tell the story of a small-time gambling casino, and to paint some of the patrons as pathetic losers at life. But this film goes beyond all that and tells its story from various perspectives.
For example, the owner of a casino (Gable)...but also a family man who is having problems with his son because the son disapproves of the gambling aspect of his father's life. The owner of the casino also has a serious heart condition, and he needs one thing to thrive -- retirement. The scenes with the son (Darryl Hickman, who is excellent) and wife (Alexis Smith, also excellent) are sentimental, but well done, and flesh out Gable's character more than one might expect from reading the blurb about the film.
While Gable is the star here, and the focus of the film, there's a wonderful parade of performances by terrific character actors to round out the film:
Lewis Stone is a down-and-out gambler...definitely quite a long ways from his days as Andy Hardy's father. He plays it superbly.
Mary Astor as the almost-other love of Gable.
Marjorie Rambeau as a high society lover of poker and a force of nature.
And, one of Gable's frequent costars -- Frank Morgan, although here Morgan is not quite so likable, but does very nicely as the opponent.
Not all of Gable's post-war films were gems, but this one is. And I know that because I don't like gambling, don't gamble, and don't understand gambling. But this film held my rapt attention. Highly recommended.