Atlantic City (1980)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Atlantic City (1980) – L. Malle

There’s something quaint and a little bit corny here in Louis Malle’s Atlantic City.  We’re treated to aging Burt Lancaster offered a glimpse of past glories (that may never have been) in a city that has also seen better days.  There’s a rough and gritty 1970s look (the clothes, the cars, the hair, the attitudes, the telephones) that you can’t really be nostalgic for, except somehow you are.  (And sitting here in the 10s, missing the 70s in a movie where they miss the 40s is pretty weird). Everyone’s down at the heels, including thirty-something Susan Sarandon who works at an oyster bar and wants to be a casino dealer (encouraged by Michel Piccoli, in a bit part as the casino owner).  Then a drug deal gone bad places Burt (playing Lou, a former numbers-runner for the mob but now a gigolo of sorts, walking the dog and rubbing the feet of a dead mobster’s widow) in the right place at the right time. So, he attempts to claim some nobility until the real drug dealers figure things out.  Although Lancaster and Sarandon give strong and “real” performances, the rest of the characters here veer toward caricature (the corny part) but there’s a warm and endearing feel nevertheless.  Not perfect by any means but this French look at fading America captures something wistful in the air (before the 80s need for greed quashed it).