Review of Owning Mahowny (2003) by Matthew H — 05 Jun 2014
-How would you rate the thrill you got from gambling on a scale of 1 to 100?
-Um... A hundred.
-What about the biggest thrill you've ever had outside of gambling?
-Twenty.
Life can sometimes overcome fiction and its rules of probabilities as shown in the real-life-based film by Richard Kwietniowski about an unassuming bank employee whose areas of his personal life slowly begin to hit a new bottom when his ability to transfer funds in an out of the bank after a promotion and approving loans to non-existent clients meet his addiction: gambling. With a low-key execution, the story unfolds patiently, but with not the impact that could mirror the mathematical and even legal implications that this event suggests it had in real life. It also carries a strong message in the end, which is only suggested with the final dialogue quoted above, but not developed fully with that intensity of living at least five times less intensely outside the addiction. Nevertheless, the grand Seymour Hoffman knows how to stay with his troubled character, and John Hurt is terrific as the badass and calculating bastard casino manager.
58/100.
This review of Owning Mahowny (2003) was written by Matthew H on 05 Jun 2014.
Owning Mahowny has generally received positive reviews.
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