Casino Film Length

4/14/2022

Ace Rothstein (Robert De Niro) is surrounded by the press at a Nevada Gaming Commission meeting portrayed in Casino. Rothstein’s lawyer, Oscar Goodman (played by Goodman himself), stands by his side. Photo courtesy of Oscar Goodman.

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Though the movie Casino was released more than 22 years ago, it still serves as a reference point for those hoping to understand what real Las Vegas mobsters were like when they were a sinister fixture in the news.

But most movies based on true stories, including Casino, twist the facts for dramatic effect and to compress long histories into a watchable timeframe.

Casino movie clips: THE MOVIE: miss the HOTTEST NEW TRAILERS: DESCRIPTION:Ace (Ro.
Film Length: 3,816 m (Portugal, 35 mm) Negative Format: 35 mm (Eastman Double-X 5222, Kodak Vision 200T 5274, Vision 500T 5279) Cinematographic Process: Digital Intermediate (2K) (master format) Super 35 (source format) Printed Film Format.

What you see in Casino isn’t exactly the way things were. Case in point: the death of the Spilotro brothers, two mobsters originally from Chicago.

The way the movie portrays it, the brothers — or at least the fictional characters representing Anthony and Michael Spilotro — are beaten with baseball bats in a cornfield and shoved into a shallow grave while still alive.

Not true.

In his 2009 book Family Secrets: The Case That Crippled the Chicago Mob, journalist Jeff Coen details what really happened. Coen covered the Family Secrets trial for the Chicago Tribune. That 2007 trial resulted in convictions and revealed details that weren’t publicly known when the movie came out more than a decade earlier.

In the 1995 movie, it was baseball bats in a cornfield. But according to trial testimony, the Spilotros were lured to a residence near O’Hare International Airport in Bensenville, a subdivision of “modest homes,” and were beaten to death in the basement. (At the trial, one of the killers, Mob turncoat Nick Calabrese, said he could not recall which house it was.)

Anthony and his brother, Michael, a part-time actor and owner of the Chicago restaurant and Mob hangout Hoagie’s, went to the home in June 1986 believing they were to be promoted within the Outfit.

Casino (1995) cast and crew credits, including actors, actresses, directors, writers and more. Release Calendar DVD & Blu-ray Releases Top Rated Movies Most Popular Movies Browse Movies by Genre Top Box Office Showtimes & Tickets Showtimes & Tickets In Theaters Coming Soon Coming Soon Movie News India Movie Spotlight.

Although the brothers were suspicious, refusing to go was unthinkable.

When the Spilotros got to the basement, about 15 mobsters pounced on them. Michael had brought a pocket-sized .22-caliber handgun but could not get to it. Anthony was heard asking if he could say a prayer but was swarmed.

In addition to breaking Michael’s nose, the attackers inflicted blunt force injuries over his entire body. They severely bruised Anthony’s face, left temple and chest.

Anthony, 48, had blood in his trachea, lungs and nasal passages and hemorrhaging in the muscles of the larynx. The 41-year-old Michael had a fractured Adam’s apple.

Neither man’s skin was broken, indicating the killers did not use a heavy object such as a baseball bat. The brothers were beaten with fists, knees and feet, according to a pathologist at the trial.

The Spilotros were dead when buried in an Enos, Indiana, cornfield about 100 miles south of the murder house. The brothers were placed in a five-foot grave in only their underwear, one on top of the other.

The cornfield is near land that Outfit boss Joseph “Joey Doves” Aiuppa used for hunting, according to Coen. A farmer discovered the grave, thinking someone had buried a deer. The Spilotros were identified by dental X-rays provided by a third bother, Patrick Spilotro, a dentist.

Why did this happen to Anthony and Michael Spilotro? Mob higher-ups felt the two had to be silenced.

Since the early 1970s, Anthony Spilotro had overseen street rackets in Las Vegas for the Chicago Outfit. He also was keeping an eye on Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal, a Chicago bookie handling the skim in Las Vegas for Midwestern Mob bosses.

Ultimately, though, news stories about Spilotro’s violent criminal activities, and his affair with Rosenthal’s wife, a former showgirl at the Tropicana hotel-casino, led to the gruesome outcome in that Bensenville basement.

Anthony Spilotro’s high-profile legal problems were jeopardizing the Outfit’s Las Vegas cash cow, prompting Aiuppa to order him “knocked down.” Michael Spilotro, facing a trial on extortion charges, had to go, too.

That terrifying outcome is not the only place where Casino misses the mark factually. In another example among many from the film, an animated Kansas City mobster pops off in an Italian grocery about the Las Vegas skim while federal authorities listen to his profanity-laced rant through a bug planted in a vent.

In reality, law enforcement authorities learned about the Las Vegas skim while eavesdropping on a conversation between members of the Civella crime family at a bugged back table in Kansas City’s Villa Capri pizzeria. Unlike the movie, there was no humorous scolding mom at the now-demolished Villa Capri nagging her mobster son about his vulgar language.

The only ones at the table were sinister Mob figures, behaving like real-life conspiratorial gangsters, not colorful movie characters.

Larry Henry is a veteran print and broadcast journalist. He served as press secretary for Nevada Governor Bob Miller, and was political editor at the Las Vegas Sun and managing editor at KFSM-TV, the CBS affiliate in Northwest Arkansas. Henry taught journalism at Haas Hall Academy in Bentonville, Arkansas, and now is the headmaster at the school’s campus in Rogers, Arkansas. The Mob in Pop Culture blog appears monthly.

#1-Casino Royale (dir. Martin Campbell, 2006)

The first outing for the ‘blonde Bond’ himself, Mr. Daniel Craig, Casino Royale was a massive hit, and a vast improvement on the dodgy 1967 original retelling of Ian Fleming’s timeless spy novel. It has since become a favourite with Bond fans and casino lovers alike, thanks to its slick depiction of the high-rolling world.

One of the world’s most notorious terrorists – Le Chiffre – is in Montenegro, where he’s playing a high stakes poker tournament, hoping to win back enough money to appease his dangerous acquaintances. MI6’s finest agent is sent out by M to play against the bad guys, and stop Le Chiffre from taking the money and getting away. The stakes are higher than ever, the women are ravishingly gorgeous, and Bond has to keep his cool in order to avoid an international catastrophe.

Captivating and edge-of-your-seat exciting, Casino Royale is a classic casino film that will stand the test of time.

#2-Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (dir. Terry Gilliam, 1998)

There aren’t many casino films which have a cult following quite as astounding as that of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, a movie based on Hunter S. Thompson’s popular collection of writings about a far-out, psychedelic and at-times terrifying road trip across the west of the USA.

Thomson has been given a large advance of cash to cover a major sporting event in the desert. What better way to spend it than dragging his deranged Samoan lawyer along for the ride, with a vast amount of narcotics and the intention to hunt out the American dream?

Hunter and his partner might not find the meaning of life, but they soon discover gamblers, corrupt cops, drug takers and dealers, strange hitchhikers…oh, and some imaginary bats and giant lizards, too…

This isn’t the side of Vegas the adverts necessarily want you to see. It’s dangerous, deranged and devilish, and holds a dark mirror up to western society in general.

#3-The Hangover (dir. Todd Phillips, 2009)

It seems there’s a whole genre of casino movies on the subject of ‘what happens in Vegas…’ but this is arguably the best of them all.

Three friends – Phil, Stu and Alan head out to Las Vegas for their best friend Doug’s big bachelor party blow-out… but they wake up the next day with no memory of the night before. So far, so normal… until they realise the bridegroom has vanished, there’s a tiger in the bedroom, and one of them has mysteriously lost a tooth and gained a wedding ring. With only a few hours to put together all the pieces of the increasingly bizarre puzzle, find Doug, and get to the wedding, it’s a thrill ride packed with laughs at every turn.

All in all, ‘The Hangover’ is a hilarious depiction of Vegas’ casinos, and more or less everything that could possibly go wrong there.

#4-Casino (dir. Martin Scorsese, 1996)

In one of Martin Scorsese’s finest hours, he depicts the juxtaposition at the heart of Las Vegas: the beauty, glamour and success on the strip, and the nasty, underhand dealings that go on behind the scenes.

Robert De Niro plays Sam ‘Ace’ Rothstein, a casino manager in Las Vegas who has connections to the mafia but who now lives a normal, quiet life with his wife. That is, until his old friend Nicky Santoro – played brutally by Joe Pesci – turns up, fully grown and now a key player in the mafia. His ambition and plans will wreck Ace’s own plans for peace and quiet, and expose an ugliness at the heart of the business.

This is a film which brings out the darkness from between the cracks of Vegas’ great casinos. Murder, greed and power reign… but what a movie!

#5-Ocean’s Eleven (dir. Steven Soderbergh, 2001)

George Clooney’s Danny Ocean has a plan. He wants to pull of a historic heist, but needs a crack team of high-flying, risk-taking and talented men and women in order to get the job done. They want to rob not one, but three of the most famous casinos in Las Vegas, and have their eyes set on a $150 million prize.

Of course, things don’t run completely smoothly, and the team come across plenty of dangers, twists and turns along the way. But will they succeed? This great movie will keep you guessing until the end.

#6-21 (dir. Robert Luketic, 2008)

Ben Campbell is an ambitious medical student, who needs a scholarship to transfer to the prestigious Harvard School of Medicine due his lack of funds. However, his maths professor, brilliantly played by Kevin Spacey, picks him out on the basis of his talent for numbers, and invites him to join his elite team of gifted individuals.

From that point on, Ben’s free time is taken up by trips to Vegas, where he makes huge winnings from card counting at the Blackjack table. But with so much money at hand, greed and corruption are never far away… and before long, disaster and hatred beckon their call.

#7-Rounders (dir. Dahl, 1998)

Matt Damon’s character in Rounders, Mike McDermott, may have a talent for poker, but he soon discovers you can’t win them all. After a disastrous game against a Russian gangster, he decides to focus solely on his studies, and leave his gambling lifestyle behind him. However, his childhood friend has just been released from prison… and he owes somebody a lot of money.

Mike is spurred back into the world of poker, in a desperate bid to help out his friend before it’s too late. A classic movie for poker fans, and great performances from the leading actors.

#8-The Gambler (Karel Reisz, 1974)

Axel Freed is a man with a complex double life. To his friends and family, he’s a mild-mannered teacher and writer, but secretly, he’s a gambling addict whose habits and expenses are spiralling out of control. He steals a wad of money from his mother, and heads to Vegas in a last-ditch attempt to win his money (and his life) back.

The Gambler is a powerful moral story about the horrors of addiction, and just what some people will do when it comes to the crunch.

#9-Rain Man (dir. Barry Levinson, 1988)

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For many people, Rain Man is the quintessential Vegas movie. It’s a fascinating tale of worlds colliding, and when Tom Cruise’s greedy and petulant character Charlie Babbit finds out about his autistic savant older brother (played in a legendary performance by Dustin Hoffman) his first thought it to take him to Vegas and let him count cards at the Blackjack tables.

All in all, it’s a film about mental prowess, family connections, and that grey area between ‘legal’ and ‘illegal’ that certain talented individuals can exploit in the casino.

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#10-Croupier (dir. Mike Hodges, 1998)

One of the few big British casino movies, Croupier quickly became a cult classic. Clive Owen plays Jack Manfred, a struggling writer desperate for cash. He gets a new job as a casino croupier, but gets sucked into the lifestyle of the casino, and in particular, a set of underhand deals that take over his life as they spiral out of control.

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A long way from Las Vegas, Croupier is a colder, harder look at the casinos on the other side of the Atlantic.

So, these are our top 10 casino movies! Do you think we’ve missed any off the list? Should some of our selections not have made the cut? Let us know in the comments!

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