Dead Money

The sharp screenplay by Josh Wilcox nails the poker lexicon yet never gets so deep in the weeds that the non-player would be lost.

It isn’t necessarily a bad movie, just a mediocre one that only reminds you of all the better films it aspires to be like.

Josh Wilcox’s screenplay is what might come about if the Coen Brothers wrote a movie around the game of poker.

Andy is appropriately moody and serious as a whip-smart high-stakes poker player, but his character quickly gets overshadowed by all the violence and stagey plot devices.

Dead Money relies far too much on the idea that some of these characters are smarter than others, only to do any intelligence a disservice by playing this silly game with its audience.


Director Luc Walpoth plays on genre cliches to build some slick, edgy tension. But the meandering plot and fuzzy point of view make it difficult to stay involved.

Walpoth knows how to handle action, and there’s plenty of it here, up close and messy, characters improvising in ways that tend to test stunt teams much more than smooth martial arts moves.

Dead Money is a poker term which refers to foolish card players who have virtually no chance of winning. What's meant to be a clever film title falls flat when the audience watching ends up being the big losers.

Moviegoers are dealt a bad hand with this lackluster crime thriller, which hints at an intriguing character study about compulsive gambling before settling for a generic revenge saga.

Andy talks about math via voice-over, but this isn't as much a poker movie as it is a darkly comic drama with poker in it. The suspense isn't therefore built at the table, but by the guns being held to the temples of people off-screen.