
The Gambler. 1974. USA. Directed by Karel Reisz. Screenplay by James Toback. With James Caan, Paul Sorvino, Lauren Hutton, Morris Carnovsky, Burt Young. DCP. 111 min.
After playing the hard-boiled Sonny in The Godfather, James Caan gives one of his best performances as an English teacher, hampered by astronomic debt, who forfeits his dignity among family, friends, and students to feed an unquenchable gambling addiction. Caan’s subtle, complex portrayal of a man’s growing anguish reinforces the film’s existentialist tone, while director Karel Reisz’s penchant for realism—in an echo of his unforgettable Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, another film about a man’s destructive urges and obliviousness toward others—offers a biting portrait of New York City in the 1970s.