A quick glance at the mock Eiffel Tower, the neon-lit fountains and tacky tall casinos and you might think Edward Berger’s lurid gambling tale Ballad of a Small Player was in Las Vegas. But this is Macau, the Las Vegas of China, and dreams go up in a puff of cigar smoke in exactly the same way. Colin Farrell plays the ridiculously-named Lord Doyle. Between his cheap green suit, the noisy (and fake) Savile Row gloves he wears, and that monicker which sounds like a villain from a dime store novel, Doyle is the kind of mark a seasoned pro could see coming a mile away. He’s a lifer in a place like Macau, or so he’d like to think. But a bad run of cards in his favored game, baccarat, has him up to his eyeballs in debt, and short on the rent to keep his swanky hotel room.
Berger has scored five Academy Awards with his previous two movies, All Quiet On the Western Front and Conclave. With Ballad of a Small Player, he switches gears once again, proving how nimble he can be as a director, which is why he’s been eyed to take over so many franchises, such as James Bond and Jason Bourne, although neither of those panned out. This is arguably his most commercial effort yet, and it should attract a number of eyeballs on Netflix from those keen to see Farrell in a flashy, artful drama from such an accomplished filmmaker.
But it’d be a lie to say that Ballad of a Small Player ranks among Berger’s best, as it’s elevated by a rich, soulful performance by Farrell. The film veers wildly from stylish comedic farce to high-stakes addiction melodrama, with nary a shuffling of the decks in-between. An adaptation of Lawrence Osborne’s novel, the film follows Doyle as he tries to turn his luck around. At this point, he’s been losing so long he might as well be William H. Macy in The Cooler. The hotel is about to kick him out on the street, and gamblers no worse off than him are throwing themselves off the top of buildings to escape their problems. The threat of suicide lingers as a result, with multiple characters at least considering it as an option. Doyle doesn’t seem like the type. He’s too pretentious, too selfish for that. But maybe, getting chased around by private investigator Cynthia Blithe (Tilda Swinton) will push him over the edge?
Swinton’s character looks and feels like she just walked in from the set of Snowpiercer. She’s too weird for the film most of the time, but when her character would fit in more neatly, that’s when she’s not around. One such moment comes with a grotesque buffet scene where Doyle gorges on anything and everything in sight, just to avoid paying the pricey bill. Berger ratchets up the volume, the comedy, and the nasty sound effects, indulging in the Volker Bartelmann score until we’re ready to pay the check ourselves and get out of town. Swinton would have been a blast to have around just for the reaction shots.
Ballad of a Small Player is much better when the action is dialed down, and Farrell can exist in this wonderfully lived-in role. That’s also when we get Fala Chen as Rainbow Casino employee Dao Ming, who understands Doyle more than he can ever know. A kindred spirit, she sees right through his facade to find the poor Irish boy underneath, the one who had nothing and fears being that way again. “Winning will get you killed faster than losing”, Doyle is told. While Dao Ming is a bit too much of an archetype of the gambling addiction drama, she’s also where the film gets a lot of its mystery and heart.
Doyle is an addict, as much hooked on losing as he is winning. Berger captures the allure of being a high roller, but also the dangers that come with it. Cranked-up scenes of overindulgence are better played with subtlety, like when Doyle struggles, literally grabbing his own arm, to not play one more hand, to not have one more drink. Farrell comes alive in these moments, and so does Ballad of a Small Player. Even when the cards are cold and the deck is stacked against him, we’re rooting for Doyle to play the hand he’s dealt all the way to victory.
Ballad of a Small Player opens in select theaters October 15th, then streams on Netflix October 29th.
