Indeed, with a flicker in her countenance that causes characters and viewers alike to wonder when she’s bluffing, Chastain gives a magnificent turn as a woman who might be Sorkin’s most quick-witted hero to date. Always one of our generation’s best actors, Chastain complements Sorkin’s need to double deal on audience expectations in this tale about a “poker princess,” who eternally dresses the part, if only because she can use words as both her armor and weaponry. It may rely on its origins in tabloid fodder to gets audiences to the table, but once there it becomes clear there’s so much more on the line. Couched in the familiar Sorkin conceit of an impending courtroom trial and deadly deposition, Molly’s story is one where she must find the buried humanity within to win over the pricy yet quixotically moral lawyer Charlie Jaffey (Idris Elba), as well as make sense of her own life story. Here is a woman who surrounded herself with movie star scum bags like the film’s “Player X” (Michael Cera), shady hedge fund managers (Brian d’Arcy James and Chris O’Dowd), and slimey New York society elites (Jon Bass), while making millions doing so… even though she once was an Olympics-bound skier trained by her unforgiving father (Kevin Costner) to rule the world. The answer to Molly’s enigma is as compelling to Sorkin’s dealings as any gliding shot of flushed hands and crashing chips. Chastain and Sorkin’s Molly is a woman who clawed her way to the top of one corner of an entitled man’s arena after another. Be it playing by the rules of her stern father on the ski slopes of Aspen, the secretarial work that bores Molly in her early 20s, or in the most decadent of glorified barrooms, Molly continuously struts into hostile territory with a light smile and plenty of décolletage that only barely masks her ambitious defiance. The mere fact that the movie wisely and efficiently chooses to ignore any and all details of Molly’s private life beyond her relationship with her father underscores how slyly principled the film is about its real interests. Thus it becomes strangely prescient for this year and subtly feminist—or at least as subtly as an Aaron Sorkin screenplay will allow. To be sure, Sorkin does well adapting his own work to motion. While never quite as slick or fluid as when a Fincher or Boyle gets their hands on his words, the first-time director does well by emphasizing an editing pattern that consistently tries to match the gait of his sprinting conversationalists. The coolness of a world filled with poker players and smiling courtesies (if rarely from the players themselves) only buoys the tone. As does when Elba and Chastain can spar about criminal law, legal fees, and perhaps Sorkin’s greatest passion, American theater (just wait for the Arthur Miller shoutouts). Fortunately, these sermons come late after the pot is already won, and the spoils are big enough to divvy among any audience. With a fully committed cast and a lead performance so tremendous that it is sure to shoot Chastain to the short list for Best Actress this awards season, Molly’s Game leaves it all on the table. Also by the same token, it’s worth going all-in for too. Molly’s Game opens on Christmas Day.
title: “Molly S Game Review” ShowToc: true date: “2025-07-14” author: “Ronald Heizman”
As with his recently nominated scripts The Social Network, Moneyball and Steve Jobs, his directorial debut is also based on the exploits of a real life figure. Adapting the memoir of the same name, Molly’s Game is about “self proclaimed Poker Princess” Molly Bloom, who became the subject of tabloid infamy a few years ago, when she was outed as the brains behind a prestigious underground poker empire frequented by celebrities, CEOs and mobsters. You can see what attracted Sorkin to this particular story, and his long-time fans will be able to spot his handiwork a mile away. It’s a sharp and snappy drama, based on a true story and structured around legal depositions and witty banter between intelligent characters. But whether you love or hate his tropes, he’s really firing on all cylinders here for his first directorial effort. In terms of his previous filmography, it’s closer to Moneyball and, surprisingly, to the mischievous approach of Charlie Wilson’s War than it is to his two big tech biopics. Molly is no Zuckerberg or Jobs, and her self-conscious narration of events, the kind of storytelling device that can so easily have gone wrong, illuminates the drama without lapsing into self-parody. But there’s no similarity between those two title characters, and Chastain is endlessly watchable as someone who is alternately either determinedly making her way in a world that is demonstrably dominated by men, or realising that she’s gotten in over her head in a very different way throughout the film. Elba is on reliable form too as the prosecutor who’s disarmed by his client’s lack of malice, and endlessly frustrated by her moral stance, keeping her word and protecting her clients even when offered an attractive plea deal as an alternative to prison. They spark off each other quite well, particularly as the film goes on, ensuring that the drama never slows when it returns to Charlie’s office in the present. Names are changed to protect the rich and famous (who apparently weren’t interested in portraying themselves for some reason), with Michael Cera giving a shark-like turn as Hollywood actor Player X and Stranger Things‘ Joe Keery, in full Steve Harrington pomp, as an immature trust fund kid. Although the identities of some characters are a matter of public record from the memoir that inspired the movie (at one point, Molly has cause to get back at Player X and I wondered if it would turn out that she wrote a draft of Spider-Man 3), the film wisely focuses on Molly’s arc rather than the scurrilous details. Elsewhere, there’s some standout work from Kevin Costner as Molly’s father, a psychology professor who instils a ferocious determination in her through both his athletic training of her, and his harsh brand of parenting. But anyone stung by the shockingly laissez-faire attitude of his Jonathan Kent in the DC movies will welcome his dad work here, for when the film inevitably shifts into longer character-defining monologues towards the end, his big moment is one of the highlights. No horses were anecdotally drowned in the making of this picture. For fans of Sorkin, its 140 minutes flies by more breezily than they have any right to, but if you’re even a little exasperated with his self-satisfied style, this is especially Sorkin-y stuff. Nevertheless, Molly’s Game is an accessible and admiring portrait that plays for and gets more nuance out of its central character than a mere tabloid curiosity, making one of the more entertaining grown-up movies of the season. Molly’s Game is in UK cinemas from January 1st.
