The Grand

2007 improvisational comedy

Rating: 14/20

Plot: Poker players converge on Jack Faro's The Rabbit's Foot casino for a winner-take-all ten million dollar poker tournament.

There's lots of talent in this one--David Cross, Harrelson, Michael McKean, Dennis Farina, Larry David's t.v. wife, Kotter, even Chris Parnell--and a few criminally unfunny ones. That's right, Raymond, I'm looking in your direction. There's also some neat cameos from poker celebrities (I especially liked seeing Doyle Brunson) although Phil Gordon, a poker player/commentator I actually like, overdoes it a whole bunch. It's a good ensemble cast with lots of eccentric goofball characters, most notably The German played by none other than Werner Herzog. There's a guy who, although his talents are behind the camera, needs to be in front of the camera more. Not necessarily in Harmony Korine movies though. The German talking about his need to kill something every day or looking for his pet bunny after his ousting from the tournament are hilarious. (A cut scene in which he reveals a secret he's discovered after travelling the world would have been the funniest bit in the movie.) The problem with The Grand is that there's far too much focus on the numerous subplots (relationships with fathers, attempts to save The Rabbit's Foot, the announcer's book, Raymond's worries about his fantasy football team) and not enough on the players doing their thing at the tables. When the jokes work, it's like flopping a flush, but when they fall flat, which they very often do, the feeling is more like having your opponent hit his three-outer on the river to take the rest of your stack. The poker in this, by the way, doesn't make a lot of sense. A movie pet peeve of mine is where chess doesn't make sense in movies, and although the poker looked real enough, the decisions these "professional" players were making annoyed me.

Jen didn't stay awake for the entirety of this one.

I had to give it a bonus point just for getting to her Werner Herzog say, "I've had a goat. To strangle a goat. . .that makes you feel really alive."

I recently watched this again, laughing more the second time, I think, than the first. I own this movie and couldn't find another comedy to watch. I feel bad for writing bad stuff about Phil Gordon. He's fine here, and so is Michael Karnow as his obnoxious co-host who sells his own books on his poker systems. There is a lot of inside poker humor that might not appeal to people who don't play the game, but there's really enough kookiness for the whole family. And Herzog! Man, I had to watch a couple of his scenes twice.