Who doesn't love a good casino movie? There's something about the charm, glitz and glamour of the gambling world that makes for great cinema… not to mention the darkness that lies beneath some of the high roller's lifestyles, the genius of card counting and the general excess that goes hand in hand with Las Vegas!
From Ocean's Eleven to Rounders, Hollywood has long been fascinated with casinos. Here are some of our favourite Casino movies for you to check out, if you don't already have them in your collection!
#1-Casino Royale (dir. Martin Campbell, 2006)
Casino Royale remains one of the most loved and watched movies in the Bond franchise. Earning an outstanding 8 stars at IMDb, the film scores points on every front, from the cool gambling moves to action-packed scenes. Featuring amazing dialog, an accurate look at casinos, and a beautifully shot Las Vegas, Ocean's 11 is an ode to old movies, a postcard view of Las Vegas, and an excellent heist thriller.
Here are some of our favourite Casino movies for you to check out, if you don't already have them in your collection! #1-Casino Royale (dir. Martin Campbell, 2006) #2-Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (dir. Terry Gilliam, 1998) #3-The Hangover (dir. Todd Phillips, 2009) #4-Casino (dir. Martin Scorsese, 1996). Casino Royale, arguably one of the best Bond films ever, is of course available for streaming as is the late great Philip Seymour Hoffman's Owning Mahowny. Croupier is available on the American, Canadian and Brazilian versions of Netflix, so British viewers will have to turn to the good old fashioned DVD to enjoy this gambling movie.
The first outing for the ‘blonde Bond' himself, Mr. Daniel Craig, Casino Royale was a massive hit, and a vast improvement on the dodgy 1967 original retelling of Ian Fleming's timeless spy novel. It has since become a favourite with Bond fans and casino lovers alike, thanks to its slick depiction of the high-rolling world.
One of the world's most notorious terrorists – Le Chiffre – is in Montenegro, where he's playing a high stakes poker tournament, hoping to win back enough money to appease his dangerous acquaintances. MI6's finest agent is sent out by M to play against the bad guys, and stop Le Chiffre from taking the money and getting away. The stakes are higher than ever, the women are ravishingly gorgeous, and Bond has to keep his cool in order to avoid an international catastrophe.
Captivating and edge-of-your-seat exciting, Casino Royale is a classic casino film that will stand the test of time.
#2-Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (dir. Terry Gilliam, 1998)
There aren't many casino films which have a cult following quite as astounding as that of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, a movie based on Hunter S. Thompson's popular collection of writings about a far-out, psychedelic and at-times terrifying road trip across the west of the USA.
Thomson has been given a large advance of cash to cover a major sporting event in the desert. What better way to spend it than dragging his deranged Samoan lawyer along for the ride, with a vast amount of narcotics and the intention to hunt out the American dream?
Hunter and his partner might not find the meaning of life, but they soon discover gamblers, corrupt cops, drug takers and dealers, strange hitchhikers…oh, and some imaginary bats and giant lizards, too…
This isn't the side of Vegas the adverts necessarily want you to see. It's dangerous, deranged and devilish, and holds a dark mirror up to western society in general.
#3-The Hangover (dir. Todd Phillips, 2009)
It seems there's a whole genre of casino movies on the subject of ‘what happens in Vegas…' but this is arguably the best of them all.
Three friends – Phil, Stu and Alan head out to Las Vegas for their best friend Doug's big bachelor party blow-out… but they wake up the next day with no memory of the night before. So far, so normal… until they realise the bridegroom has vanished, there's a tiger in the bedroom, and one of them has mysteriously lost a tooth and gained a wedding ring. With only a few hours to put together all the pieces of the increasingly bizarre puzzle, find Doug, and get to the wedding, it's a thrill ride packed with laughs at every turn.
All in all, ‘The Hangover' is a hilarious depiction of Vegas' casinos, and more or less everything that could possibly go wrong there.
#4-Casino (dir. Martin Scorsese, 1996)
In one of Martin Scorsese's finest hours, he depicts the juxtaposition at the heart of Las Vegas: the beauty, glamour and success on the strip, and the nasty, underhand dealings that go on behind the scenes.
Robert De Niro plays Sam ‘Ace' Rothstein, a casino manager in Las Vegas who has connections to the mafia but who now lives a normal, quiet life with his wife. That is, until his old friend Nicky Santoro – played brutally by Joe Pesci – turns up, fully grown and now a key player in the mafia. His ambition and plans will wreck Ace's own plans for peace and quiet, and expose an ugliness at the heart of the business.
This is a film which brings out the darkness from between the cracks of Vegas' great casinos. Murder, greed and power reign… but what a movie!
#5-Ocean's Eleven (dir. Steven Soderbergh, 2001)
George Clooney's Danny Ocean has a plan. He wants to pull of a historic heist, but needs a crack team of high-flying, risk-taking and talented men and women in order to get the job done. They want to rob not one, but three of the most famous casinos in Las Vegas, and have their eyes set on a $150 million prize.
Of course, things don't run completely smoothly, and the team come across plenty of dangers, twists and turns along the way. But will they succeed? This great movie will keep you guessing until the end.
#6-21 (dir. Robert Luketic, 2008)
Ben Campbell is an ambitious medical student, who needs a scholarship to transfer to the prestigious Harvard School of Medicine due his lack of funds. However, his maths professor, brilliantly played by Kevin Spacey, picks him out on the basis of his talent for numbers, and invites him to join his elite team of gifted individuals.
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From that point on, Ben's free time is taken up by trips to Vegas, where he makes huge winnings from card counting at the Blackjack table. Casino arkansas oklahoma border. But with so much money at hand, greed and corruption are never far away… and before long, disaster and hatred beckon their call.
#7-Rounders (dir. Dahl, 1998)
Matt Damon's character in Rounders, Mike McDermott, may have a talent for poker, but he soon discovers you can't win them all. After a disastrous game against a Russian gangster, he decides to focus solely on his studies, and leave his gambling lifestyle behind him. However, his childhood friend has just been released from prison… and he owes somebody a lot of money.
Mike is spurred back into the world of poker, in a desperate bid to help out his friend before it's too late. A classic movie for poker fans, and great performances from the leading actors.
#8-The Gambler (Karel Reisz, 1974)
#7-Rounders (dir. Dahl, 1998)
Matt Damon's character in Rounders, Mike McDermott, may have a talent for poker, but he soon discovers you can't win them all. After a disastrous game against a Russian gangster, he decides to focus solely on his studies, and leave his gambling lifestyle behind him. However, his childhood friend has just been released from prison… and he owes somebody a lot of money.
Mike is spurred back into the world of poker, in a desperate bid to help out his friend before it's too late. A classic movie for poker fans, and great performances from the leading actors.
#8-The Gambler (Karel Reisz, 1974)
Axel Freed is a man with a complex double life. To his friends and family, he's a mild-mannered teacher and writer, but secretly, he's a gambling addict whose habits and expenses are spiralling out of control. He steals a wad of money from his mother, and heads to Vegas in a last-ditch attempt to win his money (and his life) back.
The Gambler is a powerful moral story about the horrors of addiction, and just what some people will do when it comes to the crunch.
#9-Rain Man (dir. Barry Levinson, 1988)
For many people, Rain Man is the quintessential Vegas movie. It's a fascinating tale of worlds colliding, and when Tom Cruise's greedy and petulant character Charlie Babbit finds out about his autistic savant older brother (played in a legendary performance by Dustin Hoffman) his first thought it to take him to Vegas and let him count cards at the Blackjack tables.
All in all, it's a film about mental prowess, family connections, and that grey area between ‘legal' and ‘illegal' that certain talented individuals can exploit in the casino.
#10-Croupier (dir. Mike Hodges, 1998)
One of the few big British casino movies, Croupier quickly became a cult classic. Clive Owen plays Jack Manfred, a struggling writer desperate for cash. He gets a new job as a casino croupier, but gets sucked into the lifestyle of the casino, and in particular, a set of underhand deals that take over his life as they spiral out of control. Zodiac sign games.
A long way from Las Vegas, Croupier is a colder, harder look at the casinos on the other side of the Atlantic.
So, these are our top 10 casino movies! Do you think we've missed any off the list? Should some of our selections not have made the cut? Let us know in the comments!
We love a casino movie. They somehow always bring all of the emotions – we find ourselves swinging from nervous laughter to cheering celebrations, and of course, the stomach-sinking feeling that comes with a loss. That's always a feeling we prefer to get from our television screens, not real life!
We've learned a lot about gambling from our favorite casino movies, emboldening us when we find our way to some of the tables in Vegas, or, when Vegas isn't an option, our first choice substitute, Quebec online casinos.
As we double down on our online casino love, we're running through some of our favorite casino movie scenes – the ones we'll rewatch over and over again.
Swingers
Such a classic film, Swingers is really where we were introduced to the magic that is Jon Favreau and Vince Vaughn together. Trent (Vaughn) drags Mike (Favreau) to Vegas. Because where else can you break out of a funk?
The two manage to find the most depressing casino ever, and then Mike still manages to embarrass himself at a $100 minimum bet table.
Trent's declaration that you 'always double down on 11' has become part of the blackjack lexicon, making this one of the most iconic and hilarious casino scenes of all time.
Ocean's Eleven
The poker scene at the beginning of Ocean's Eleven with Brad Pitt & George Clooney is just classic Hollywood, the intro to the first installment of the franchise. It's a friendly game between buddies before Brad Pitt, George Clooney, and the squad pull off the full-blown heist.
There are a lot of great quotable lines in the game; one of the fan favorites is 'I'm not sure what four nines do, but the ace I think is pretty high.'
Rain Man
Rain Man has all the feels anyway, so the casino scene gets us good. Dustin Hoffman's Ray doesn't quite know what he's doing in the casino, and yet, he manages to make some magic happen.
Complete with matching suits, Ray and Charlie (Tom Cruise) take on the casino, and find themselves in one of their biggest bonding moments. Charlie has to let Ray take the lead, and when he says 'hit me' over and over again, our stomachs are tied up in knots. Ray's genius math skills save the day and we feel like our hearts might just explode.
The Hangover
The Hangover's take on the Rain Man casino scene is one of our favorites of all time. The oddball of the group of partiers, who's also the groom's brother, Alan (played brilliantly by Zach Galifianakis), has read a book on counting cards, so they head off to a blackjack table.
Complicated equations appear on the screen as Alan watches the cards intently. Finally, he sits down, calls his friends in, and starts betting big. This scene elevates to one of our favorites when his buddy Phil (Bradley Cooper) screams, 'He can't lose!', and Heather Graham quite literally is knocked off her feet.
Casino near big bear. Tombstone
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Easily one of the very best westerns of all time, and one of Val Kilmer's best roles, the gambling scene in Tombstone has Kilmer's Doc Holiday hitting the highest levels of drunkenness. After an epic 36 straight hours of poker, he's feeling pretty good, and still his hilariously wry self.
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In a movie full of Holiday's hilarious one-liners, Holiday rattles off one of the very best in this scene, 'Maybe poker just isn't your game. I've got an idea, let's have a spelling contest.'
