Movie Review: Aaron Sorkin Bets Big on Jessica Chastain and Idris Elba in “Molly’s Game”

Writer Aaron Sorkin, having his first crack at directing with Molly’s Game, learns it helps to have pros like Jessica Chastain and Idris Elba at your table.

It’s always fascinating to see which actors can and can't speak Aaron Sorkenese.

Justin Timberlake, an acting novice back in 2010, couldn’t hack it in his big break, The Social Network.

Kate Winslet—who, you don’t need me to tell you, has a pretty good handle on this acting business—similarly struggled in the Sorkin-penned Steve Jobs.

Surprisingly, Olivia Munn proved to be one of the best to ever do it, thanks to her turn in Sorkin’s otherwise thankless The Newsroom.

The biggest joy of Molly’s Game—the directorial debut from the Oscar-winning screenwriter and West Wing creator—is discovering his two stars, Jessica Chastain and Idris Elba, speak Sorkenese beautifully, sliding effortlessly into his rat-a-tat screwball rhythms. Off their tongues, it's as smooth as French.

Of course, it's not just about talking at the speed of light; often, Sorkin's characters have to sell an old-fashioned idealism in a corrupted, modern world. On The West Wing, the actors relaying his dialogue could make eyes well with tears. On The Newsroom, eyes rolled so hard they were in danger of ejecting out of the head. In Molly's Game, he finds a safe in-between space, and my eyes just watched on, intently.

Partly adapted from the memoir of the same name, Molly’s Game depicts the unlikely rise and inevitable fall of “poker princess” Molly Bloom (Chastain).

It’s one hell of a true tale. Bloom, after barely walking away from a disastrous skiing accident as an Olympic hopeful, went on to run the most lucrative underground poker games in Los Angeles and New York. But as the flick begins, she’s snagged by the FBI for her apparently illegal operation and forced to lawyer up. It takes a little arm-twisting to convince the uber-ethical Charlie Jaffey (Elba, playing a fictional character) to defend her in court. 

While prepping for the trial, we hear how the richest of the rich came to her table in Los Angeles, including some high-profile Hollywood actors, who are combined here into the dastardly amalgam referred to only as Player X (unexpected yet convincing villain Michael Cera). Player X pulls one over Molly and unravels her L.A. game, forcing her to take her talents to the East Coast. That's where she lowers her guard, lets some Russian mobsters in on the fun, and draws the unfortunate attention of the Feds.

At 140 minutes, Molly’s Game is a touch too long, and though Sorkin’s script is super compelling (and somehow manages to explain poker hands, Ponzi schemes and skiing techniques in a digestible manner), you can’t help but think that another director would have reined him in, for the better.

That said, as a filmmaker, he’s not so in love with his writing that he keeps the camera static on his actors as they recite his lines. Molly’s Game lacks the visual flourishes of David Fincher or Danny Boyle. Still, it does what movies are meant to do, and moves, even if the characters don't walk-and-talk as they might have back in the day.

Chastain and Elba, who basically trade showstopping speeches when not replicating the back-and-forth of His Girl Friday, are deliriously fun to watch. One-scene-wonders like Bill Camp (as a gambler who loses it all over one terrible streak) and Joe Keery (yes, your boyfriend Steve from Stranger Things) swing by Molly’s table and keep the film fresh over its two-and-a-half hours. Kevin Costner pops up as papa Bloom in one of the picture’s eye-rollingest (and most 'vintage Sorkin') moments. Sorkenese may not be Costner's first language, but at least he doesn’t mangle it.

Molly’s Game is being sold as a timely feminist yarn from Sorkin, who previously joked about his ability to write for women on 30 Rock (“listen lady, a gender I write extremely well if the story calls for it”). That may be stretching it, despite his efforts to rescue Molly Bloom from her fate as tabloid fodder and reinvent her as virtuous.

It is, after all, Elba who gets the big day-saving monologue at the end.

3.5/5

In Australian cinemas 1 February. Rated M for mature themes, violence and coarse language.

Photo: Entertainment One