Molly’s Game (2017)

☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Molly’s Game (2017) – A. Sorkin

“Molly Bloom” is a role that would have gone to Julia Roberts in the not so distant past and somehow Jessica Chastain doesn’t seem as quite so good a fit (despite her impressive acting chops).  Having not paid much attention to the U. S. tabloid news, I wasn’t aware of Bloom at all, but writer Aaron Sorkin, in his directorial debut, fills in all the gaps in her true story.  We begin with Bloom’s olympic skiing career which ended abruptly with an accident and then jump around in time, learning about her coincidental and then hugely profitable move into hosting big stakes poker games.  These games, beginning in Los Angeles, attracted celebrities and billionaires (including perhaps Tobey Maguire, who is dubbed Player X and played by Michael Cera here).  We also see the FBI raid that took Bloom down and her interactions with her lawyer (Idris Elba).  The film seems too long and too uneven.  Sorkin may have doubled back a few too many times in the telling, although the editing keeps things going at a good clip and the acting is generally strong.  In the end, despite a focus on Bloom’s integrity (protecting the identities of her players and the confidential goss she learned about them), there isn’t much of a point to the film, except perhaps to make us all feel bad that there are billionaires who live in this world who can do whatever they want.