Casino (Movie Review)

Unlike most movies, Casino is not just about gangsters. It is about how casinos are an all-encompassing experience for gamblers and the business that serves them. The movie lays bare the corruption in Las Vegas and how it spreads throughout society like a disease, involving even blue-collar union workers, politicians, and mob families from New York. It’s a fascinating, sprawling look at how the city that never sleeps became an incubator for greed and betrayal.

The film also shows how casinos are a form of a fake paradise, designed to lure people in with dazzling lights and noise, and then keep them playing by offering near-misses (like the slot machine’s “wound”). But there’s something deeper at play here as well: Casino reveals a sense of nostalgia for a time when Vegas wasn’t just a playground for the rich but a place where people from all walks of life gathered together. This sense of community is missing from the modern era, where the world feels increasingly isolating and the only way to interact face-to-face is through digital connections.

While the movie does have its share of gruesome violence, including a torture scene by vice and a baseball bat beating that was so brutal it had to be trimmed for an NC-17 rating, it’s the performances, especially by Sharon Stone as Ginger, that make it shine. In her first major role after Basic Instinct, she is both the feisty and vulnerable woman who can’t help but be pulled into the ring of gambling and the ensuing corruption.