It’s been a long time since I walked out of a movie halfway through.

Sadly Rupert Wyatt’s remake of the 1974 James Caan film The Gambler, originally directed by Karel Reisz ( The French Lieutenant’s Woman), had exactly this impact on me when I went to my local cinema to catch it a few days ago.

The story of a college professor/gambling addict Jim Bennett (Mark Wahlberg), who is in significant debt to a variety of serious folk including The Wire’s Michael Kenneth Williams and an Asian gambling ring, fails to capture the menace and urgency of it’s 40 year old inspiration, considered to be an overlooked classic.

This remake from the director of Godzilla even manages to make Jessica Lange and John Goodman look amateurish.

Thankfully NOTHING can make Omar (Williams) look bad. Even the silly cap he wears, much to Wahlberg’s amusement…

There’s much better fare about, so go see those instead.

2 Stars.