A window on betting subculture

Sports betting is America’s dirty little secret. As much as $200 billion per year is bet on sporting events in this country, most of it illegally. Little acknowledgment of the scope of this issue appears in the media. If anything, newspapers, magazines, radio and television shows promote gambling by discussing point spreads and odds. The advent of the Internet has given gamblers even easier access to the action and probably hastens their financial ruin.

“Two for the Money,” starring Al Pacino and Matthew McConaughey, is a window on this subculture. Pacino stars as Walter Abrams, owner of a New York betting service with its own 900-numbers and a cable television show. On the ground floor Abrams has people manning the phones, and callers are paying $25 for an early line on that weekend’s games. On the second floor is where the big money is made. Here Walter has his best prognosticators working with high-rolling clients. There is no charge for the best tips, but the winners are expected to pay a percentage of their take to the service. Technically, Walter is not breaking the law because he’s not taking bets.

McConaughey plays Brandon Lang, a onetime hotshot college quarterback who still works out incessantly in the misguided hope he can eventually hook up with a pro team. Barely making ends meet while he waits for a break that will never come, Brandon works a miserable job at a phone service where he makes recordings for pay lines such as the Britney Spears fan club. One day the guy who does the football hotline is sick and Brandon fills in. Using his knowledge of the game, Brandon is amazingly accurate and eventually comes to Walter’s attention. A first-class airline ticket and some spending cash is all that it takes for Brandon to jump at the chance.

Starting on the phone lines, Brandon maintains a remarkable streak with his football picks, so much so that Walter quickly moves him upstairs and has him working under an alias. Walter has given Brandon more than a new name: He has created an entire persona, a cocksure super-salesman who easily pushes his clients to bet more and more.

Walter’s life is risky in every regard. His wife Toni (Rene Russo) tells Brandon that Walter is held together by 12-step meetings. “If it says anonymous at the end of it,” she tells him, “he goes.” At one Gambler’s Anonymous meeting, Walter tells the members they all share a defect that requires them to lose everything to feel alive. When they win, they just keep gambling until they lose.

This philosophy rules Walter’s life, and one never knows what’s a con and what isn’t. Walter lays everything on the line every day -- his health, his business and even his family. For a while Brandon tries to play the game, but Walter tends to wear everyone out eventually.

Pacino delivers one of his patented scenery-chewing performances. While I feel he has a tendency to overact, his bigger-than-life persona suits Walter well.

Russo is glamorous and a little pathetic as Walter’s long-suffering wife, and McConaughey is believable as the ex-jock who’s in over his head.

“Two for the Money” is not actually a sports move but a psychological drama that takes place in an industry that perverts sports toward another end. “Two for the Money” is fast-paced and well-acted and definitely keeps your attention.

‘Greatest Game’ can’t overcome its own obstacles

Everybody deals with obstacles. Two popular obstacles movie characters confront are those involving an adversary and those dealing with one’s own short-

comings. “The Greatest Game Ever Played” weaves both types of obstacles into a story based on actual events.

At the rate the main character, Francis, is developing his golf skills, he has the potential to be the Tiger Woods of his day. In the early 1900s, however, his working-class background reduces his opportunities to somewhere between slim and none. The closest he gets to a golf course, given the expense of playing and restrictive membership rules, is as a caddy to the idle rich.

The club members love to gamble and win, so when an amateur golf championship between American and British players comes to town, the men he caddies for sponsor him in the tournament. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Francis to play alongside top world golf champions. Francis’s dad, however, tells his son that if he plays he must leave home, because golf won’t teach him how to earn a living and raise a family.

Although his father may be correct about the game not putting money into his son’s pocket, competition allows Francis to learn about himself. Being adept at hitting the ball is easy; keeping your mind focused on the task at hand is difficult. Problems at home -- like those between father and son and doubts about one’s talents -- throw even the best of players off their game. Francis has to overcome his feelings of low self-esteem if he is to stay in the game.

There are older and younger counterparts to Francis who have similar experiences -- middle-aged Harry from England and 10-year-old Eddy, caddy to Francis. These three characters, the challenges they face on the golf course and the inner demons they struggle with are the film’s greatest strengths. Out of the three, Eddy is the scene stealer, rattling off wise-cracking lines like “roll it and hole it” to Francis as he faces a difficult shot. If you can picture Danny DeVito and Joe Pesci from “My Cousin Vinny” rolled into one, that gives you an idea of what Eddy is like.

The movie, however, has its own obstacles that it fails to overcome. The majority of the rich in the film are blatantly bigoted toward the poor. It is overkill to the point of being unbelievable. Some are going to be rude, but the majority?

Still, there is something to admire and enjoy about the film, and that is its ability to inspire people by showing what it takes to excel in life. Inspiration is Disney’s trademark. While not the greatest movie ever made, this one is worth watching at some point along the movies’ life span -- if not in the theater then on DVD or cable.20051013h03b38ke(LA)20051013h0stonke(LA)