Kind of funny, even if perverted

Rating: 8/10 (5 October 2010)

Be it true or not, the story is funny. A rather impoverished student at MIT decides to accept a proposal to make some easy money, since he is good at numbers, by playing Black Jack in Las Vegas. That student will get the scholarship he needs to go to Harvard medical school that costs 300,000 US dollars. He is dragged into the black jack business by some math teacher who is using a group of students to make easy money (he gets 50% of the winnings) without being seen because he is persona non grata at all and forever in Las Vegas, though they do not know his face. That professor is of course a crook and when one night, unsettled by some riff raff with his best friends, our student, Ben, loses a lot, the professor destroys everything: he blocks him at MIT, he visits his room and steals his money that was hidden in the false ceiling, ruining at the same time his dream of Harvard, he even tells the security people that the student is back at the black jack table. But the student gets his revenge on the professor, the hard way, but he had to deal with the security boss in the casino who cheats him in his turn and he is still without any money left. But that really dazzles the Dean of Harvard Medical School who interviews him a second time: he went to Las Vegas 17 times, won the 300,000 dollars twice and they were stolen from him twice too. Apparently that is a dazzling life experience that deserves a scholarship. That film is immoral, wicked, perverted, and that student is going to be a doctor. I just hope he does not gamble with the life of his patients the same way. And yet it is fascinating because it demonstrates some people are ready to do absolutely anything to satisfy their desires, to reach their goals, to succeed, no matter what it may be. At the same time some are ready to betray anyone to get even or get revenge or just to get a profit out of these others. But are you sure you would not do that too? You can't imagine what some very decent people were able and ready to do in Nazi concentration camps just to be a Kapo, which meant they had a chance to survive longer. In some situation you cannot know what you would do. Anyway, to defeat casinos on their own ground is absolutely funny for us the spectators and must be absolutely funny for the "gambler" even if he has to be good with figures, which means slightly autistic, which means slightly retarded. But a rich retarded person has a lot of fun in life, provided he has a real good brother and he is "an excellent driver".
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Paris 8 Saint Denis, University Paris 12 Créteil, CEGID