American Casino

Though there's likely a stronger documentary than "American Casino" to be made about the recent Wall Street collapse and subprime mortgage disaster, it's still hard not to be shocked by this stranger-than-fiction look at how a toxic mix of unbridled greed, mass financial manipulation and the probable effect of a 2000 government deregulation act upended our nation's entire economy. Director Leslie Cockburn, who wrote and produced the film with her journalist husband, Andrew, reportedly shot as the housing market meltdown and megabuck bank and insurance company bailouts were literally unfolding. While this lends the project a kind of you-are-there timeliness, the movie also feels as if the Cockburns created its structure as they went along. The result is a lopsided, visually uninspired film that works best when it eschews the complex numbers-crunching of its financial industry pundits and whistle-blowers to profile the everyday victims of the crisis. These include primarily several Baltimore-area African Americans who were among the many minority home buyers targeted for exploitive, high-rate, wildly confusing subprime loans. These hard-working folks' emotionally charged stories of losing their houses, life savings and dignity because of predatory lending practices (an extended tour of a teacher's up-for-auction home is especially heartbreaking) could have, and perhaps should have, filled their very own documentary.
Da The Los Angeles Times, 18 settembre 2009