Gone Full Tilt: The Card Counter (2021) - Reviewed

Paul Schrader returns to cinemas with his latest release, The Card Counter. After 2017's Dark and First Reformed, the director makes another cinematic mark with his latest effort, one that continues his study of lost male souls and their wayward journeys into the abyss. 

The film starring the ever sleek and always stoic Oscar Isaac as a traveling gambler is a slow burn character study that may not suffice for many audiences and may turn more away with its themes of torture and man's desire for the dark and twisted. Returning to the days of his Taxi Driver script, Schrader doesn't shy away from his world of lonesome men that are furthering their own downward spiral. The Card Counter shares many elements of his previous works under a careful eye that truthfully captures another artistic statement despite the guise of an often times sluggish story. 

As a movie about gambling, this is a departure because it doesn't celebrate the lifestyle or its woes, but instead lends itself to a unique perspective about a man that's using the card playing circuit to fill a void in his life. It keeps him on the straight and narrow, despite his own personal demons and his glaring flaws. Along the way, he meets a random teen and a financial backer that bring something new to his life. They give Isaac's character a new purpose which is one of love and caring, away from his years spent in military prison. There is a duality here that shows both the vile side of the war and torture tactics while it also convinces us that any person might not be saved from this world of brutality.

Where most movies about gambling seem to glorify the wins or turn the losses into tales of addiction, Schrader carefully deflects his film into a unique arthouse study that brings Isaac's perfected drama game and sets it against a modern backdrop of casinos and gaming tables with a sensibility that's derived from the old school road movie. Sadly enough, Isaac, Haddish and Sheridan are never given enough room to rise above a script that continuously revels in the dark and brooding, in a final product that's almost too bleak . This is what Schrader does best but beats us over the head with it repeatedly during the course of The Card Counter. There does come a time when audiences understand the message. Instead of refraining, he berates and beats us over the head with it. 

This isn't Schrader's best catalog entry, but it does sit well with his long line of reality based movies. You can't expect to go into The Card Counter as a reference point for pure entertainment. It's a hard watch with moments of pure pain that could trigger an emotional reaction from victims of abuse. However, the point is made and it's a reflection some of us could use to see. 

-CG