Runner Runner (2013)
Directed by Brad Furman
When a poor college student who cracks an online poker game goes bust, he arranges a face-to-face with the man he thinks cheated him, a sly offshore entrepreneur.
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What critics compared Runner Runner to
In its early moments, the movie evokes everything from The Social Network to Casino.
Affleck wants us to think Robert De Niro in “Casino,” but I was more scared of Robert De Niro in “Little Fockers.”
A cautionary tale about the danger of shortcuts and the seductiveness of pretty faces, however lightly they overlie ugly souls, Runner Runner forgoes the Jacobean grimness of Martin Scorsese's Casino in favor of a sleek, slick lesson in playing the odds while keeping a jaundiced eye on an exit strategy.
Another failing of Runner Runner is that, despite providing a few tantalizing glimpses behind the curtain of online gambling, it never goes the full Casino to flesh out the setting.
Films like " The Sting ," " Casino ," and " Ocean's Eleven ."
Partially that’s because it’s so reminiscent of the Jim Sturgess-Kevin Spacey casino-based thriller “21.”
2008's cool, chic, informative card-counting drama " 21 ," this is not, and the further "Runner Runner" bumbles along, the more synthetic it appears.
The script seems modeled on too many luridly escapist books like Ben Mezrich’s Bringing Down the House and The Accidental Billionaires, and the film resembles 21 and The Social Network, beautiful sagas of smart guys getting into trouble—and increasingly wide and mobile frames—once they leave the dorm room.
From the writers of Rounders, but closer in quality to 21 , Brad ( The Lincoln Lawyer ) Furman’s online gaming thriller is a strange beast.
It won’t satisfy anyone looking for action or thrills or, you know, actual card playing, nor will it sate viewers hoping for the substance of “The Social Network” or the flashy fun of “21.”
Every time the film threatens to rise to the greatness of another gambling film like Rounders (one of the previous credits for the screenwriters, Brian Koppelman and David Levien), stilted voiceover, predictable plot twists and style over substance bring it crashing back into the company of something more like 21.
Only one Troll refuses to attend the party: the reclusive Branch (voiced by Justin Timberlake, of “Runner Runner” ), a sort of doomsday preparer who is convinced that the Bergens will find them again and who thinks the Trolls have lulled themselves into false security and weakness.
McAdams' role is small yet pivotal, her performance nothing short of a master class.The boxing scenes are gripping and violent in "Southpaw," each jab and sucker-punch joltingly captured by cinematographer Mauro Fiore's (2013's " Runner Runner ") roving camera and edited with taut fluidity by John Refoua (2013's " Olympus Has Fallen ").
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Aided by ace cinematographer Mauro Fiore's (2013's " Runner Runner ") brooding, glittering location lensing in Boston and editor John Refoua's (2013's " 21 and Over ") unhurried but always absorbing pacing, Fuqua displays an emotionally attached control of his production's many facets.