Smokin' Aces

For a brief while back in 2006-07, I purchased my way to a friendship with the Leagues of Alamo Drafthouse fame.  They wanted to save their downtown theater, but their original ten-year lease was ending, the warehouse district had exploded in popularity, and the only way they could afford to stay was to become a non-profit.  They founded the Heroes of the Alamo Foundation, dedicated to preserving vintage and genre film presentation in downtown Austin - in other words, to keep the Original Alamo open.  My wife and I joined as our first big philanthropic donation.

It was a good year.  Part of our membership included free access to all Alamo Downtown events.  Despite living out in the suburbs at the time, we made great use of this perk, attending many events, hanging out with the owners and staff, and, for me, for the first time feeling part of the Austin vibe.  And when Butt-Numb-A-Thon came around, Tim held a few seats for us members and got me in, despite having never heard of the event or Ain't It Cool News.

This was the year of Octobuttnumbathon, and I was not prepared.  I do not like missing part of a film, even credits, and when Harry played a scratchy 1930s Irish gangster film in the middle of the night, or the 1980s Hanna Barbara animated adult film, I was awake through all of it.  Oh, what a fool I was.  For by the next morning, approaching the 24 hour mark of film, I lacked a changed of clothes or deodorant, and was jittery from caffeine pills.  I called my wife to pick me up, and when she arrived I had to bail.  Not only did I miss the final film in its entirety - an early screening of 300, but I left with 25 minutes to go on the previous film, Smokin' Aces.  So that gets around to the movie.

I like Guy Ritchie films.  Big ensemble British gangster just works.   Joe Carnahan apparently likes them as well, since he copied them to make this.  Except for him, gangster films are set in the Nevada, and feature a wild and improbably ensemble of characters that would otherwise never make it through the front door of any respectable establishment.  Classy, they aren't.  When Buddy "Aces" Israel decides to turn mob informer, mob boss Primo Sparazza puts a hit out on him.  As word spreads, several teams converge on Lake Tahoe to protect him, arrest him, or cut out his heart.  Violence ensues.

Clearly seeing the ending of the film was high on my list, since I managed to wait six and a half years to rent it.  Well, anyway, now I have, and I don't have to watch it again.

When the Leagues made the deal to get the Ritz location, the days of the Heroes Foundation were numbers.  We were able to attend the Last Night at the Alamo, and I took home my favorite chairs, but our year membership expired before the Ritz opened, and with it went our "in" with the clique.  Since then, neither the owners nor staff have acknowledged that they ever even knew who I was.

Smokin' Aces
2006, 107 minutes, directed by Joe Carnahan

Casino Royale

Raw. Rash. Sharp. Brutal. Tragic.

Casino Royale
2006, 144 minutes, directed by Martin Campbell

To be honest, I saw two separate, 30-minute snippets at my wife's aunt's house on Independence Day - Miami and Venice. I knew what to expect, but it is still a shock.

Ocean's Eleven

My wife recommended this series to me, having seen part of the third in a hotel months ago. We both sat down to see her Netflix copy of the first movie tonight.

I like this sort of large-cast adventure, with all the bits and pieces falling into place. I'm not sure why I skipped this one on release, as it kept me from seeing the rest. I'll fix that shortly.

As to be expected, some of the plot points are made for film. Big machine with green goo that knocks out power to the city? Heh. I appreciated it for the fun the props department must have had thinking it up. There's nothing wrong with a little fun, and this move was full of it.

Ocean's Eleven
2001, 116 minutes, directed by Steven Soderbergh

21

My second film of SXSW was the opening night screening, a big-studio production premiering just before its theatrical release. 21 is loosely based on the book Bringing Down the House, about the MIT blackjack team that took Vegas for millions. They made some drastic changes as Hollywood is prone to do - added a Harvard Medical motivation so the main driver isn't "merely" greed, and rewrote the love angle - but I found it surprisingly good. The screenwriters had a strong story to start from, and their flourishes didn't didn't detract from the rich, lively plot.

21
2008, 123 minutes, directed by Robert Luketic