This is one of the best movies I've ever watched about addiction, and it's about gambling addiction, so it's one of the rarest too.
Although it looks like another TV night movie, where it is all about very average production, always close-ups, superficial analysis, and not well acting to say the least. But HEY. Wait a whole big minute. Not all the TV productions are the same, and your worst nightmares of whatever hasty, poor or idiot TV movies you've watched before are not here.
(Cynthia Gibb) is a very good actress that forces you to wonder; where is such a very good actress ?! A bitter question while Hollywood is filled with a lot of overrated fallen stars already. Despite her golden smile and charming charisma, (Gibb) in (High Stakes) was looking a bit older than her real age, with some sense of weakness or pain, which with her meager body made her great for the role, and as fragile as that psychologically sick, wounded and sad woman. Her performance was impressively real and catchy, without a second that you might feel that she was acting. She delivered a super performance like in the scene of her torturous first night at the sanatorium which was unforgettable.
The movie's cinematic elements were clever, cooperating to make an effective message about addiction. We have: the smart script of (Marshall Goldberg) which presented the psychoanalysis expressly in emotional way. A romantic yet doleful pace; for example, the softy montages so many times to portray the tragedy of that helpless woman, as she isn't the criminal inasmuch as a victim. The bluesy music with a crying sax all the time. And director (Donald Wrye), who was nominated for the Oscar of The Best Documentary 2 times before, made successfully that passionate spirit and deplorable warm feeling, in a truthful atmosphere, despite being in the humble frame of a usual TV movie.
Let me tell you, whoever watches this movie will not forget it, not because the influential melodrama of its complicated situation, but for its scrutiny and sensitivity.
Although it looks like another TV night movie, where it is all about very average production, always close-ups, superficial analysis, and not well acting to say the least. But HEY. Wait a whole big minute. Not all the TV productions are the same, and your worst nightmares of whatever hasty, poor or idiot TV movies you've watched before are not here.
(Cynthia Gibb) is a very good actress that forces you to wonder; where is such a very good actress ?! A bitter question while Hollywood is filled with a lot of overrated fallen stars already. Despite her golden smile and charming charisma, (Gibb) in (High Stakes) was looking a bit older than her real age, with some sense of weakness or pain, which with her meager body made her great for the role, and as fragile as that psychologically sick, wounded and sad woman. Her performance was impressively real and catchy, without a second that you might feel that she was acting. She delivered a super performance like in the scene of her torturous first night at the sanatorium which was unforgettable.
The movie's cinematic elements were clever, cooperating to make an effective message about addiction. We have: the smart script of (Marshall Goldberg) which presented the psychoanalysis expressly in emotional way. A romantic yet doleful pace; for example, the softy montages so many times to portray the tragedy of that helpless woman, as she isn't the criminal inasmuch as a victim. The bluesy music with a crying sax all the time. And director (Donald Wrye), who was nominated for the Oscar of The Best Documentary 2 times before, made successfully that passionate spirit and deplorable warm feeling, in a truthful atmosphere, despite being in the humble frame of a usual TV movie.
Let me tell you, whoever watches this movie will not forget it, not because the influential melodrama of its complicated situation, but for its scrutiny and sensitivity.
