Lady Vegas (2012)

Lady Vegas: Directed by Stephen Frears. With Rebecca Hall, Joel Murray, Hugo Armstrong, Corbin Bernsen. Ex-private dancer Beth aspires to be a Las Vegas cocktail waitress, when she falls in with Dink, a sports gambler. Sparks fly as she proves to be something of a gambling prodigy–much to the ire of Dink’s wife, Tulip.

“Beth Raymer (Rebecca Hall) is a concealed depth ditz. This squeaky-voiced Floridian upstart is off to Las Vegas as a cocktail waitress (she dreams big) as soon as her industry gig ends unceremoniously. But since Sin City is a union city, it is difficult to get through drink-tray-hauling careers.So itu0026#39;s down to the underground, specifically a sports-gambling operation – Dink Inc .- run by weak-willed bruiser Dink Heimowitz (Bruce Willis), where Beth finds her inherent ability to place winning bets, as well as attracting a number of shady characters.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eBased on the same name memoirs by Raymer and directed by old-professor Stephen Frears (The Queen) as an Occupy-era screwball comedy, Lay the Favorite is frenzied without being funny. Like Judy Holliday on a particularly manic day, with a bubbly effervescence that is technically impressive but increasingly exhausting, Hall tears from scene to scene.(The scene in which Joshua Jacksonu0026#39;s clean-cut reporter wildly hesitates between aggressive and submissive poses is indicative of the whiplash-inducing tone of the film.)And the farcical machinations- from a jealous, plastic-surgery-obsessed wife to a pony-playing parolee with a prospective link to the FBI – pile up with an inelegance that makes you long for Lubitsch or Hawks u0026#39; deft comic touch. You can readily close the iron gate on this one bugged-out burlesque.”