Review of Atlantic City (1980) by Daniel C — 09 Jun 2010

Louis Malle will always retain a special place in my cinematographic heart. Without resorting to climaxes or high emotional situations, he always succeeds in plunging deep in human emotions, and show the true nature of his characters.

He just has to film them, and the shots are always enough for one to understand. No words, just the shots. In the 50's, Malle was Jacques Cousteau's assistant, but later in the decade, at the dawn of the glorious french Nouvelle Vague, he was right there where it mattered.

Early on in my teens I fell in love with great early pieces such as "Ascenseur pour l'échafaud" (1958) or later films such as "Au revoir les enfants" (1987), and, most of all, "Lacombe Lucien" (1974) an incredible masterpiece and one of my favorite movies.

"Atlantic City", not of course reaching Lacombe's status, it is still a very good and important movie. It was Malle's greatest take in America (although it was a French-Canadian production), and ended up being nominated for the top 5 Oscars (Picture, Director, Actor, Actress and Screenplay), despite having won none.

It is set in a decrepit and run-down sea-side Atlantic City. A sleezy small-timer (Robert Joy) and his pregnant girlfriend steal a bag full of drugs and run away to Atlantic City, to hide in the apartment of ex-wife (and sister of the girlfriend) Susan Sarandon, who works at the casino, has dreams of going to Monaco and who is unaware of the fortune they hold.

Actually, the first minutes are excellent, as there is no dialogue, and we see with great fluidity the robbery and the relation of Surandon to her neighbor, an old Burt Lancaster, who voyeuristically watches her through the window.

Without talking, in the first few minutes we know everything about these 3 major characters. Brilliant. Lancaster is an old small time crook who aspired to be a great mobster, and who now is just an old man.

When all of a sudden Joy is killed for the drugs, Lancaster sees himself with all that money (because Joy had stashed the bag in his apartment), and his dreams of behaving like a big gangster seem to come true.

He takes care of Sarandon and despite the age different she falls for him, and both seem to have a bright future. All this takes place in just 2 days but off course the drug dealers won't leave them alone, and go after the money and them.

So, they have to confront their lives and their dreams in the shadow of this threat, that becomes more real and more powerful as the hours pass... The entire movie is decrepit and attuned to the sleaziness of its characters and the ugliness of the town it is set in.

But in this dirt Lancaster shines, as a has been that never was, a child with dreams of gangster that never grew up, a small-racketeer that ultimately has a good heart. Sarandon (at the time Malle's girlfriend) was blooming into a brilliant actress and it shows perfectly.

There are also other side characters, as Kate Reid and an appearance by the great Michel Piccoli. In the end, the movie runs through the consequences of low-life and old age, of finding a place in life if you are a nobody, but has lighter tones than other Malleâ??s movies.

Brilliantly stared and directed, "Atlantic City" is a character study, and ends up being all about Lancaster. The man was one of the greatest personalities the screen ever knew, and this movie shows that to perfection.

20 years after his greatest performances in the 50s and 60s, Burt Lancaster proved that he was still one of the best in the game, and paved the way for other great old-age 80s performances in â??Local Heroâ?? (1983) or â??Field of Dreamsâ?? (1989), before his sad passing in 1994.