“Luck Be a Lady” is a song written by Frank Loesser in 1950 and first performed by Simon Mullins. The song was featured in the musical Guys and Dolls.

The lyrics relate the point of view of a gambler, Sky Masterson who hopes that he will win a bet, the outcome of which will decide whether or not he is able to save his relationship with the girl of his dreams.

Marlon Brando sang the song in the 1955 film version.

Jack Jones recorded it for his 1964 album, Bewitched, arranged by Shorty Rogers.

Later, it became a signature song for Frank Sinatra, first released on the album Sinatra ’65, rereleased on Reprise Musical Repertory Theatre. It was released as a duet with Chrissie Hynde on Duets II (1994). The song was also recorded by Barbra Streisand for her album Back to Broadway.

Trivia

The song was parodied in the Simpsons episode “Mayored to the Mob” as “Luke be a Jedi”. It also has been used in the OST from The Cooler, a movie which deals with Casino life (and also death) in Las Vegas. It also had one line sung by the Doctor, in the Doctor Who episode “Rose”. The song features prominently in the film Mrs. Doubtfire when Robin Williams’ character is given a makeover to “become” a woman. The electronica group Fila Brazillia also references the song in the title of their album Luck Be a Weirdo Tonight.

Season 4 Episode 6 of the television show The L Word featured the song and used it as the title of the episode.

The song has also been used in various TV commercials.

On The Real World: New Orleans, cast member David Broom sang a slightly modified version of this song, “Come On, Be My Baby Tonight.” He repeated this performance on an episode of Chappelle’s Show.

Links

• Allmusic Entry
• Barbra Streisand Archives: Records/Back To Broadway (1993).

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Directed by Adrian Lyne
Produced by Sherry Lansing
Written by Novel: Jack Engelhard
Screenplay: Amy Holden Jones
Starring Woody Harrelson, Demi Moore, Robert Redford, Seymour Cassel, Oliver Platt
Music by John Barry
Cinematography Howard Atherton
Editing by Joe Hutshing
Distributed by Paramount Pictures
Release date(s) April 7, 1993 (1993-04-07)
Running time 118 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Budget $38,000,000
Gross revenue Worldwide: $266,614,059

Indecent Proposal is a 1993 drama film, based on the novel of the same name by Jack Engelhard. It was directed by Adrian Lyne and stars Robert Redford, Demi Moore, Woody Harrelson, Seymour Cassel and Oliver Platt.^{[1] [2]}

Plot

Childhood sweethearts David (Harrelson) and Diana Murphy (Moore) are a married couple who travel to Las Vegas, hoping they can win enough money to finance David’s fantasy real estate project. They place their money on red in roulette and lose. After gambling away all of their savings, they encounter billionaire John Gage (Redford). Gage is attracted to Diana and offers David one million dollars to spend a night with her. After a difficult night, David and Diana decide to accept the offer, and a contract is signed the next day. Gage flies Diana to a private yacht, and it is assumed that their arrangement is consummated.

Although he had hoped to forget the whole incident, David grows increasingly insecure about his relationship with Diana, consumed with a fear that she remains involved with Gage; this insecurity is heightened by the fact Diana discovers that Gage has bought their home/property while it was going into foreclosure. Because of this tension on their relationship, David and Diana separate. Gage actively persists and renews his advances on Diana. Although she initially resists, Diana eventually consents to spending time with him, and a relationship develops. David, meanwhile, realizes he cannot go on without the love of his life. When Diana files for divorce, David makes one final attempt to win her back by signing the divorce papers and giving the million dollars away.

Gage sees how Diana looks at David and recognizes that, even if she stayed with him, their relationship would never achieve the intensity she had with David. It is revealed that Diana and Gage did not have intercourse on the contracted night, and a guilty Gage admits to her that she was only the latest in a long line of “million dollar girls”. She leaves Gage and returns to David.

Cast

• Robert Redford as John Gage^[3]
• Demi Moore as Diana Murphy
• Woody Harrelson as David Murphy
• Seymour Cassel as Mr. Shackleford
• Oliver Platt as Jeremy
• Billy Bob Thornton as Day Tripper
• Rip Taylor as Mr. Langford
• Billy Connolly as Auction M.C.
• Sheena Easton as Herself
• Herbie Hancock as Himself

Reception

Box office

The film was a box office success, earning $106,614,059 in the U.S. and $160,000,000 internationally for a worldwide total of $266,614,059.^[4][5]

Critical response

Despite the film’s success at the box office, it received mostly negative reviews from critics.^[6] Gene Siskel gave the film thumbs down. Roger Ebert, however, gave it thumbs up on Siskel & Ebert.^[7] Ebert also wrote a positive print review.^[8] The film was nominated for seven Razzie Awards, and won three: for Worst Screenplay, Worst Picture and Worst Supporting Actor (Woody Harrelson).

Differences between the novel and the film

In reviewing the novel on which this film is loosely based, the New York Times summarized its themes as, “The sanctity of marriage versus the love of money, the Jew versus significant non-Jews such as shiksas and sheiks, skill versus luck, materialism versus spirituality, Israel versus the Arab countries, the past versus the future, and the religious world versus the secular one.”^[9] To those who have seen the film but not read the book, it should be immediately apparent based on that quote that, although this film shares some thematic elements with the novel that inspired it, the underlying plot is entirely different.

In Engelhard’s novel, the main character Joshua is a Jew, and his billionaire foil is an Arab. The extent to which this distinction matters is difficult to overstate, because it changes the entire point: the mental battle between Joshua and his rival is not merely a game of money but rather an extension of the power struggle inherent in the Arab-Israeli conflict, and everything that follows – even down to the references to krav maga – is part of the symbolism of the story.

References

Links

• Indecent Proposal at the Internet Movie Database
• Indecent Proposal at Rotten Tomatoes

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

from the album The Gambler
Released November 15, 1978
Format Vinyl
Genre Country
Length 3:32
Label United Artists
Writer(s) Don Schlitz
Producer Larry Butler

“The Gambler” is the title track to Kenny Rogers’ 1978 album The Gambler which won him the Grammy award for best male country vocal performance in 1980.^[1] Bobby Bare had recorded the song earlier that same year in his album BARE CBS KC35314 (1978). The song was written by Don Schlitz who had recorded it previously, and had charted at #65 on the country charts with it. It was one of five consecutive songs by Rogers to hit #1 on the Billboard country music charts. On the pop chart, the song made #16 in early 1979.

It is also the theme song used for Rogers’ long running TV movie serial of the same name, in which he stars as a fictional professional poker player called Brady Hawkes. It was used in Episode 2 of BBC series Blackpool.

Story

The song itself tells the story of a late-night meeting on a train “bound for nowhere” between Rogers (as narrator) and an unnamed old man who is the gambler. The gambler tells Rogers that he can tell Rogers is down on his luck (“out of aces”) by the look in his eyes and offers him advice in exchange for the last swallow of whisky Rogers has. After the gambler takes the drink (and a cigarette), he gives the following advice:

The gambler then mentions that the “secret to survivin’ is knowing what to throw away and knowing what to keep” and that “the best you can hope for is to die in your sleep”. At this point, the gambler puts out the cigarette and goes to sleep.

At the end of the song we are told that “somewhere in the darkness the gambler he broke even”, and that the narrator finds “an ace that I could keep” in his final words. Rogers’ rendition on the Muppet Show indicates the Gambler actually dies.

Chart performance

References

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.

Directed by Sydney Pollack
Produced by Sydney Pollack, Richard Roth
Written by Judith Rascoe, David Rayfiel
Starring Robert Redford, Lena Olin, Raúl Juliá, Alan Arkin
Music by Dave Grusin
Cinematography Owen Roizman
Editing by Fredric Steinkamp, William Steinkamp
Distributed by Universal Pictures
Release date(s) December 12, 1990
Running time 140 min.

Havana is an independent 1990 drama starring Robert Redford, Lena Olin and Raúl Juliá, directed by Sydney Pollack and with music by Dave Grusin. In the film, an American professional gambler named Jack Weil (Redford) decides to visit Havana, Cuba to gamble. On the boat to Havana, he meets Roberta Duran (Olin), the wife of a revolutionary, Arturo (Julia). Shortly after their arrival, Arturo is taken away by the secret police, and Roberta is captured and tortured. Jack frees her, but she continues to support the revolution.

Plot

The plot is set on the Eve of the victory of the Cuban Revolution, January 1, 1959.

On the boat from Miami to Havana, Roberta Duran enlists the aid of Jack Weil (Robert Redford) in smuggling in U.S. Army Signal Corps radios destined for the Cuban revolutionary forces in the hills. Jack Weil agrees only because he is romantically interested in Ms. Duran. When they rendezvous for the “payoff”, Roberta reveals she is married, dashing Weil’s hopes.

Weil meets up with a Cuban journalist acquaintance (Tony Plana) and during a night on the town they run into Roberta Duran and her husband, Dr. Arturo Duran. Dr. Duran (Raul Julia) is a leader of the revolutionary movement. When Roberta points Weil out to him, Dr. Duran invites Weil to join them for dinner, and asks Weil for further aid to the cause. Weil turns him down, even after Duran outlines the desperate situation confronting the Cuban majority.

The next morning, after a night of debauchery for Weil, but a night of arrests of revolutionaries by the secret police, Weil reads a newspaper account of Dr. Duran’s arrest and death. In shock he continues with the planned poker game, at which he meets the head of the secret police. He learns that Roberta was also arrested and held. She was also tortured. Weil uses the debt one of the other players (a lieutenant) owes him, to obtain Roberta’s release. In shock from her husband’s death and her own experience in jail, she agrees to let him shelter her in his apartment, but that afternoon she disappears. Realizing that he is in love with Roberta, and encouraged by an old gambling friend, Weil drives into the interior of Cuba to find her at Dr. Duran’s old estate. He persuades her to return with him to Havana and to leave Cuba with him. When she asks, he explains that a lump on his arm contains a diamond he had sewn into his arm in his youth, as insurance that no matter what happens in life, one always has that diamond.

He makes arrangements for her to leave Cuba via boat, but on his return to the apartment, he is assaulted by two Cubans who inform him that Arturo demands that he get Roberta out of the country. In amazement that Dr. Duran is still alive, he wrestles with himself and pretends to Roberta that nothing is amiss. He uses the time thus bought to confirm the story with a CIA agent (Daniel Davis) whose acquaintance he had made. He obtains the information by threatening to blow the agent’s cover of gourmet magazine writer, then uses it also to make a deal with him regarding Dr. Duran. Pretending to work for the CIA, Weil goes to see Dr. Duran, who is held by the chief of the secret police (SIM). He tells the chief that Washington has new plans for Duran and wants him released, with a payoff of $50,000. He “orders” the chief to have Duran cleaned up and dressed (Duran had been tortured and was in extremely bad shape) and taken to his house. Weil goes to a doctor, then a jeweler, to sell the diamond to raise the cash for Dr. Duran’s release.

Back at his apartment, he informs Roberta, who had decided to make a life with him, that her husband is still alive. In shock she leaves on her own to find her husband. Meanwhile, Weil had blown the big game with high rollers he had been angling for since the day he arrived in Havana. The casino manager (Alan Arkin) forgives him, knowing he had made rescuing Roberta his priority.

That night, New Year’s Eve, 1958, the insurrection is won by the revolutionary forces. The upperclass, the government and the secret police all leave their lavish New Year’s Eve parties to make a mad dash to the ports and airport to leave the country. The people pour into the streets, celebrating the victory by trashing the casinos and dancing in the streets. Weil and (Arkin) agree it is a new day and time for them to go.

The next morning Weil is in a restaurant preparing to depart when Roberta shows up to wish him farewell. She discovers, by seeing the bandage on his arm, what it had cost him to save her husband for her. They hug goodbye. She remains with the Revolution, and he has been changed by it. Every year he drives down to the Florida Keys to gaze across the water toward Havana, hoping one day to see her again, but also realizing that the changes in Cuba were being echoed in the changes of the 1960s happening in America.

The closing credits, consisting of a beautiful Caribbean sunset with an equally beautiful and haunting musical finale by composer Dave Grusin, is an essential part of the movie, as is the entire bittersweet musical score. Raul Julia’s name does not appear in any of the credits.

Cast

Robert Redford as Jack Weil
Lena Olin as Bobby Durán
Alan Arkin as Joe Volpí
Tomás Milián as Menocal
Daniel Davis as Marion Chigwell
Tony Plana as Julio Ramos
Betsy Brantley as Diane
Lise Cutter as Patty
Richard Farnsworth as the Professor
Mark Rydell as Meyer Lansky
Vasek Simek as Willy
Fred Asparagus as Baby Hernández
Richard Portnow as Mike MacClaney
Dion Anderson as Roy Forbes
Carmine Caridi as Captain Potts

Links

• Havana at the Internet Movie Database

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Directed by Karel Reisz
Written by James Toback
Starring James Caan, Paul Sorvino, Lauren Hutton
Music by Jerry Fielding
Distributed by Paramount Pictures
Release date(s) October 1974 (USA)
Running time 111 min.
Language English

The Gambler is a 1974 movie starring James Caan, Lauren Hutton, and Paul Sorvino.

The film is loosely based on the short novel The Gambler by Fyodor Dostoyevsky^[1][2] and was filmed at a time when leading actor James Caan was battling his own addiction to cocaine. Caan was nominated for a Golden Globe for his performance.

Plot

Axel Freed is a New York City English professor with a gambling addiction that begins to spiral out of control. In the classroom, Freed inspires his college students with his interpretations of Dostoevsky. In his personal life, Axel has the affection of the beautiful Billie and the admiration of his family, including his mother Naomi, a doctor, and his grandfather, a wealthy businessman.

Unbeknownst to them, Axel’s reckless gambling on basketball games has left him with a huge debt. His bookie Hips likes the professor personally but threatens grave consequences if he doesn’t pay up.

Axel’s descent into addiction requires him to extort a hefty $44,000 from his mortified mother to repay what he owes. He goes away with Billie to a casino where he makes a small fortune, only to blow it all again on basketball bets.

He takes out his anger on Billie, who doesn’t appreciate having loan sharks come to their apartment in the middle of the night. Expecting help from the grandfather who loves him, Axel gets nothing but the older man’s disappointment and disgust.

The only solution left is to lure one of his students, a basketball star, into accepting a bribe to deliberately shave points in a game so that Axel can pay off his debts. Having corrupted a previously innocent youth, Axel is so appalled by his own behavior that he masochistically confronts a dangerous man who leaves him with a bloody and permanent reminder of his actions.

Cast

James Caan as Axel Freed
Paul Sorvino as Hips
Lauren Hutton as Billie
Morris Carnovsky as A.R. Lowenthal
Jacqueline Brookes as Naomi Freed
Burt Young as Carmine

References

Links

• Rotten Tomatoes
• The Gambler at the Internet Movie Database

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.