This is a not too bad of a look at how the east coast mafia branched out in the early 1940s to the west coast, and their kinda crazy guy Bugsy...Uhm. … Benjamin Siegel… went out to make a deal they couldn’t refuse. Along the way, he found something else. A bit of a vision, you could say, in the deserts of Nevada. A new model, from nothing. The Flamingo Casino and Hotel. The dude was maybe a bit crazy. But regardless his other flaws, he had a dream and he stuck to it.
Overall this is an okay Hollywoodized telling of the story, maybe a bit tame all things considered, maybe a bit long in the runtime. Released a year after Scorcese’s Goodfellas, this one jumps back a bit more for some 1940s mafia actions. Warren Beatty does fine as the charismatic Bugsy, Annette Benning as his kinda-whooorish muse, who may also be a bit batshit crazy, but practical. A bit melodramatic, but it ultimately is a period piece and it shows in the good sets, clothes and overall vibe. It’s The starts of Las Vegas and its significantly mafia backings, whether they liked it or not. At least then. Pretty sure they appreciated that initial investment, as steep as it was, in later years. Now? Slowly. Silently. A new boss took over. And that desert Paradise, at least to some? It’s morphed into something completely different now. Maybe a bit cleaner on some levels, dirtier on many others. Still too close to it to say, but I’d say 2020 was the final nail in its coffin after the Corporations squeezed too much out of the dying cash cow it held, Coof Shutdowns took place, and legalized gambling continues to take hold everywhere else. I guess it had a good run though, an interesting Postcard of Americana at its best and worst. A place for happiness and regret, money and booze, fear and loathing. It’s got it all.
