Lady Chance

The Cooler is an odd but ultimately satisfying mixture of real feelings, unexpected violence and improbable situations set against of the backdrop of a Las Vegas nearly gone from this world.

William H. Macy plays Bernie, the Cooler of the title. He is a man whose luck is so bad that it not only infects his own life, but can be rubbed off on unsuspecting gamblers at the Golden Shangri-La casino where he works. By merely touching the table where a winner is betting he can change their luck to bad, thereby cooling off their winning streak. It is in this capacity that he meets a cocktail waitress named Natalie (Maria Bello) who begins a relationship with him after he cools the luck of a customer who gets fresh with her. As the unlikely couple begin to form a strong bond, Bernie's luck begins to change. It is when Shelly (Alec Baldwin), the casino manager and boss to both Bernie and Natalie imposes his will on the situation that Bernie's newfound luck and love are tested.

Macy has spent his career playing hapless losers and hard luck characters. In Bernie, he hits the jackpot, delivering a well modulated, brave performance. Brave because he allows Bernie to be shown for what he really is, a not overly attractive, middle aged loser in both body and spirit. Macy shows us a lot of himself both literally and figuratively and it is that which brings a sense of truth to the performance.

Baldwin, who is being billed as a mere co-star is actually a major player in the story. Shelly is a character who utilizes more brute force than the usual steely-eyed verbal barrages that Baldwin excels at. But Shelly is a great character for Baldwin, a man so sure of his place in life and even in Vegas history that he will not bend under any amount of pressure. The Golden Shangri-La is, according to Shelly, the last of the old-style Vegas casinos. The proposed remodel of the casino threatens Shelly at a deep level, making him all the more inflexible. This is definitely bad news for anyone Shelly comes into contact with who would try to thwart his will in any way, including Bernie and Natalie. It is a tribute to Baldwin that the Shelly is someone the audience can never find it in their hearts to dislike completely, despite his intolerable actions.

If in the end, the improbabilities of the story overshadow the ending, it is a fairly minor consideration. This is a movie of performances more than storytelling. Macy's performance is so fine and delicate that one is hard pressed to see how difficult it must have been to do. Bello, as Natalie, shows an underlying fragility that draws the viewer to her and shows us why Bernie would love her. And Baldwin is the hurricane force wind that rages and storms through the proceedings. And it is the audience who is lucky enough to see it all.

A "cooler" is a guy who stands next to you in a casino when you are having a winning streak that is suddenly interrupted. It is someone who has such a bad luck that people around him are influenced; he could be pretty important for casino bosses. The cooler here is Bernie and the face of William H. Macy is perfect for him. The casino boss is Shelly in a wonderful performance from Alec Baldwin. Soon Bernie will leave, but not before he has met and fallen in love with Natalie, played by Maria Bello (for me only known from 'Payback' and 'Coyote Ugly'), a third terrific performance. She seems to like him also and suddenly that means Bernie is lucky. This will give, unfortunately for Shelly and therefore himself as well, results on the casino floor. Things are getting complicated.

The story is pretty original and entertaining on itself. A sub-plot that deals with the idea of remodeling the casino into a more modern one, not if it is up to Shelly, gives him a reason to be annoyed and show his more cruel side. Baldwin is at best in these scenes. The performances take the film to the next level. Baldwin won an Oscar nomination and it is pretty clear why. You believe him the entire time, no matter what he does. From Macy we expect a good performance, he is one of the best character-actors out there. I was also pleasantly surprised with Bello, an Oscar nomination would not have been strange here; she is very good, even great in the scenes with Macy. In the end 'The Cooler' is a good film, becoming better through performances, entertaining all the way through.

The Cooler is worth seeing just for Alec Baldwin's performance alone. An old style casino boss, his inability and unwillingness to accept the new Vegas sends his volatile nature over the edge. Baldwin has always been an underrated actor- at the start of his career, the big studios made the mistake of trying to market him as a star, rather than as the quality actor that he is. He is also helped by working alongside another great actor, William H Macy, who can do more with a look than most can do with 6 OR 7 pages of dialogue ( See the scene when he realizes Maria Bello is still in his flat ). See this film for the acting. It's good to see that films like The Cooler and 21 Grams are doing well and being recognised - it is a triumph for acting and strong scripts as opposed to continual FX and CGI in modern cinema.

"The Cooler" has really divided viewers. Some, definitely not all, are taken with William H. Macy's first-ever sexy role where he shows his buns (and a bit more) as Bernie the Cooler, a key employee at the Shangri-la, a Las Vegas casino a bit shopworn and out of touch with the latest and hottest on the Strip. A cooler is a guy who shows up by the side of a punter on a long winning streak and, somehow, extinguishes his luck merely by hanging around the table and acting like a klutz.

Maria Bello is a cocktail waitress, Natalie, relegated to the low end of the casino where elderly day trippers bet small amounts. Feeling sorry for her, and perhaps a bit attracted, Bernie gets her transferred to the big spender zone where, presumably, tips are better. One thing leads to another and - wow - Macy is, according to a few of my female friends, a heck of a lot sexier than, say, a wannabe babe magnet like Brad Pitt.

Running the casino is Shelley, Alec Baldwin. Shelley has a problem: the casino's investors (a euphemism) want to tear down the place and build a new, modern joint that will pack in the younger high rollers. A sentimentalist at heart, as well as a gangster, Shelley wants Shangri-la - which does turn a profit as he points out to the guys demanding change - to stick it out as the last classy, old style casino. This is the stuff of eyeball to eyeball confrontation.

Natalie is the catalyst for a change in Bernie's luck - and lust. From an initially awkward conjoining, the two fall deeply in love and find they're in synch in the sack. So she's no longer a catalyst, she's the Significant Other.

Bernie has some family issues with his lackluster son and Natalie has to deal with problems with Shelley that would merit a lawsuit about a hostile workplace . Shelley - poor guy - really needs a dedicated cooler, Bernie is the best and he knows, he thinks, how to insure renewed employee dedication.

No Nevada gaming authority or cops here - this casino seems to be in a parallel universe where the honchos make their own rules independent of even the semblance of regulation. There can't really be a Shangri-la like this place in Las Vegas (I'm sort of sure).

Macy delivers a terrific performance as a schlepp who finds he has the heart of if not a lion at least a fierce tabby. Bello handles the shifting moods of her character very well-she's a good actress. And very pretty. Baldwin turns in a predictably dependable job as a tired mobster/businessman who holds true to values rejected by the new generation of Organized Crime wiz kids (one persistent pest sent to remake the casino is dismissed as a "Harvard turd").

All in all, a good movie especially because it showcases Macy in an unexpected role where he demonstrates the depth of his enormous acting ability.

WARNING: Very explicit sexuality and some in-your-face brutality. Not for kids.

7/10.

I thought it was a great love story. The violence was a little much, but I guess it needed to be there. The sound track was wonderful, also. It was good to see an everyday guy get the girl. Two flawed people coming together to find happiness!