Casino 1995 Screenwriters

Casino (1995)
Robert De Niro – Ace Rothstein
Sharon Stone – Ginger McKenna
Joe Pesci – Nicky Santoro
James Woods – Lester Diamond
Don Rickles – Billy Sherbert
Alan King – Andy Stone
Kevin Pollak – Phillip Green
L. Q. Jones – Pat Webb
Screenplay by Nicholas Pileggi and Martin Scorsese, based on Pileggi’s book Casino: Love and Honor in Las Vegas (1995)
Directed by Martin Scorsese
Colour. 178 min.
The real title of this movie is GoodFellas 2. The same director, the same screenwriters, the same story with plenty of violence but no soul, even the same two thirds of the leading cast. Everything is pretty much the same. It is not often that you see a director repeating himself so completely within five years. Only this movie is even longer, flashier and more boring than GoodFellas (1990). De Niro gets the spotlight here, but he is still wasted in a role that manages to be long and unrewarding. The greatest tragedy in the life of Ace Rothstein is that Las Vegas is not what it used to be. “Today it looks like Disneyland”. Am I expected to be moved by that? Sharon Stone at the height of her sex appeal is a nice bonus. But if this is the greatest role in her career, as so many reviewers claim, she must have had a poor career indeed. Personally, I liked her better in Basic Instinct (1992) and The Quick and the Dead (1995). I don’t really know why Joe Pesci didn’t get another Oscar for his role here. If you can see any difference between Nicky Santoro and Tommy DeVito, you can see more than I can. Ultimately, this movie is a slick and glitzy ride. That’s all it is. Ironically, it’s not unlike Las Vegas, all flash and no substance. No, this is unfair to Sin City. However superficial it may be, it still has more heart and soul than Scorsese’s exercise in blandness. ( )