Classic Film Review: Damon, Norton, Famke, Turturro and Landau deal the cards — “Rounders” (1998)

The knock on “Rounders” (1998) was always that it was, to quote a review or two at the time of its release, “lazy.”

It’s a genre pic, gamblers’ ups and downs as one (Matt Damon) tries to focus on law school and his law school classmate/girlfriend (Gretchen Mol) and law school mentor (Martin Landau) as his disreputable hustler pal (Edward Norton) drags him back into his favorite vice.

There aren’t a lot of ways for this hand to play out, and director John Dahl (“The Last Seduction,” lots of TV in recent years) and two screenwriters pick the lightest and one could make the case, the lamest.

Damon was young, with a young Hollywood haircut, playing another version of that smart, motormouthed working class knowitall “type” that launched his career in “Good Will Hunting” the year before. So the writers wrote him lots and lots of little “read the player/read the room” monologues, some delivered in the lazy screenwriter’s best friend — voice-over narration.

“I’ve often seen these people, these squares at the table — short-stacked and long odds against them, all their outs gone — one last card in the deck that can help them.

“I used to wonder how they could let themselves get into such bad shape, and how the hell they thought they could turn it around?”

Very Matt Damon speech to make. Very lazy screenwriting to give it to him.

But it’s a GENRE picture. It’s not about the surprises, but the execution, the immersive milieu, the colorful characters. “Rounders” delivers that to perfection. It’s a film that captures a moment in time. And it prefigured the global “Texas Hold’em” poker craze. Hell, even James Bond found himself playing Hold’em and not Bacarat when “Casino Royale” was remade.

I swear I never pass by this film while channel-surfing without stopping to savor Damon, Norton and a long line of colorful supporting players — Chris Messina, Michael Rispoli and Bill Camp before they were famous, Turturro and Oscar winners Damon and Landau, Oscar nominee Norton and future X-woman Famke Janssen.

Damon, a great raconteur and chat show guest (Jimmy Kimmel be damned), has long been telling this hilarious story about working with the odd-accent-slinging John Malkovich, who plays Russian mobster/poker room operator and player Teddy KGB, that’s become a part of the film’s lore.

So there’s a lot to relish in “Rounders,” as it’s become one of those mainstream “cult” films that gets better with age — like “Fight Club.”

The story — Mike McDermott’s a New York law school smarty with a beautiful classmate/live-in girlfriend. He likes to play cards and swim with the sharks, but he keeps that under control for her sake, and to ensure his future.

But when his old running mate Worm (Norton) gets out of prison, Mike finds himself going on a gambling bender to help settle Worm’s gambling debts with Teddy KGB (Malkovich) and the thug called Grama (Rispoli).

Everwhere Mike turns, there’s an old rival/friend (Turturro) who sighs at the lost potential of a player who is great at “reading” the table, the cards and his chief rivals, or a gambling debt collector/barmaid (Janssen) he used to have a thing with. Even the judge (Landau) who is his law school mentor has a “friendly” game of academics and other lawyers that Mike interrupts and “reads” like an old pro.

“You were lookin’ for that third three, but you forgot that Professor Green folded on Fourth Street and now you’re representing that you have it. The DA made his two pair, but he knows they’re no good. Judge Kaplan was trying to squeeze out a diamond flush but he came up short and Mr. Eisen is futilely hoping that his queens are going to stand up. So like I said, the Dean’s bet is $20.”

Worm weasels Mike back into the then-underground world of poker rooms as these “Rounders” — slang for hardcore players — travel from Rahway to Bronxville, Newark to Atlantic City and the bowels of NYC in search of quick cash.

Worm’s a known cheat, but Mike lets him dragshim to the games, winning legit until Worm worms his way onto the same table and starts looking for shortcuts.

That never works out. The movie is about the ballooning nature of Worm’s debt, the beatings and threats to his future Mike endures. Beautiful, rich and about to get richer girlfriend? Law degree?

Norton is in rare, antic form here, showboating about how he doesn’t know Mike when they’ve weaseled into a game with strangers, losing sorely to ensure Mike can win big, taking a bunch of frat boys for a ride, for instance.

“Like my uncle Les used to say “When the money is gone, it’s time to move on”. So enjoy it, you secret handshaking assholes.”

Landau gets to make the big “disappointment to my father” old Jewish judge speech. Mol plays the “It’s me or poker” card as the girlfriend.

“Lazy?” Sure. This movie lays down a straight or a flush, never a straight flush.

But this world is a rare thing, a piece of the “California Split” past before poker and gambling blew-up and ate the early 2000s. We watch gambling movies like that Altman classic and this Dahl classic and “Mississippi Grind” to sample a lifestyle we’d never have the nerve to try. That’s all we really want from this genre.

Hearing Damon recite the script’s poker-professional slang and pro poker player name-dropping might seem “lazy” and heavy-handed. But it’s musical in Damon’s hands. The guy can tell a story.

“Listen, here’s the thing. If you can’t spot the sucker in your first half hour at the table, then you ARE the sucker.”

And there’s no dishonor in critics’ dismissing a film that goes on to become a classic of its genre and a cultural touchstone. Well, maybe a little. But I guess J. Hoberman’s glad to be remembered for something.

Rating: R, violence, drug abuse, profanity

Cast: Matt Damon, Edward Norton, Famke Janssen, Martin Landau, Gretchen Mol, John Turturro, Michael Rispoli, Chris Messina, Bill Camp and John Malkovich

Credits: Directed by John Dahl, scripted by David Levien and Brian Koppelman. A Miramax release on Pluto TV, Amazon, etc.

Running time: 2:01