Customer Reviews

Music of Chance [VHS]

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

James Spader and his "True Colors" co-star Mandy Patinkin play a pair of newly-acquainted men who hope to out-play an eccentric pair of millionaires in a high-stakes poker game. Not only do they lose, but they must work off their debt in a rather unorthodox indentured-servitude kind of way. Both men had their own financial troubles and reasons for getting into the poker game in the first place, but neither of them realized exactly how costly their repayment would be.
In an interesting casting twist, Spader plays the oily, hustling loser of the two.
The final scene poses an interesting possibility - that the end result of their misadventure is part of the cyclic karma that put them there in the first place. Or something like that.

Making a film from a brilliant novel is a risky venture any way you look at it. The list of failures would run into the thousands. Granted, there have been some good ones: 'The Godfather' series comes to mind. So when I came across ~ The Music of Chance~ in the video store, I thought, "Will I take the chance?" How could anyone make or even think about making a film from this exceptional novel? It would be too difficult. Well, without question, director and co-screenwriter, Phillip Haas, pulled it off with such flair and elegance that it drove to return to the novel and experience once again.

James Nashe (Mandy Patinkin) has taken to the road without any particular destination in mind, and has been travelling for over two years. One day he picks up Jack Pozzi (James Spader), a poker player of apparent talent. An instant friendship follows, and they go in for a bizzare game of poker with two millionare, highly eccentric recluses in a far off manor in Pennsylvania. A strange twist of chance occurs during the game and our two protagonists lose everything. The two recluses make a deal to even up the debt, which James and Jack will regret for the rest of their lives.

The movie and novel's genius is the surface-mundane plot and the profound themes simmering underneath the day to day. What does it really mean to take responsibility for one's actions? How far do we take responsibility with others? Is there such a thing as luck? Are we fated to suffer as human beings? Is there growth in suffering? Can we control our destinies and how do we react when hard times befall us? The novel and surprisingly the film ask these weighty questions directly and through metaphor, pushing us to think about our lives.

One of the disappointing aspects about watching a film adaptation is the characters and environment never match-up to what one mentally generated while reading the book. Directors, too, will use creative licence and insert their own interpretation, at times ruining the original plot. Haas remained on task, however, and the film ran very close to the novel. Mandy Patinkin is James Nashe and James Spader as Jack Pozzi was as close to an accurate interpretation of a literary charcter as one could possibly attain: first class acting.

~The Music of Chance~ has been described by some as being a parable on the human condition. If one watches closeley, this film, without being entirely conscious of it, guides you through the big questions, and gently leaves you pondering.

This film is very cool, intelligent with an incredible amount of panache.

This was a very enchanting and absorbing story, with wonderful acting and some memorable lines of dialogue. What particularly stuck with me was the character Nash(played by Mandy Patinkin)and his attitude about misfortune in life. No one is totally in control of what happens to him, and misfortune befalls everyone. The point is that it serves no purpose to feel sorry for yourself when something goes wrong for you, you should just work work towards getting out of the predicament you are in(and accept whatever you can't change). Everyone has things they want in life, and everyone has to undergo some kind of hardship to get them. It made me feel that there is a kind of inspiration even in what you have you have to suffer when overcoming your setbacks, because it is all part of the same process of setting yourself free to realise your dreams. This idea was symbolised in the story when the two main characters are held in a seemingly inescapable situation on the grounds of a mansion, working off their debt to two millionares by building a wall for them. It's the kind of film that could lead you to great things-it could inspire you to accept austerity unflinchingly to get what you want. What a blessing this film!

Music of Chance is a wonderful movie. If you are into movies that leave you wondering, this is one for you. I have seen in 15 times, and I still ask myself questions at the end. It is wonderfully acted, expecially Nash, played by Mandy Patinkin, he is a wonderful actor and brings wonders to his role. I would recommend this to everyone! It is a great drama with a hint of comedy.

This is an outstanding film with outstanding acting. Why it's not on DVD is beyond me.

James Spader, Mandy Patinkin, and Samathan Mathis's breakthrough performances.

This movie is only for intellectuals, so not surprising that it is not popular release. Paul Auster appears briefly at the end.

This film deserves to be ranked among the best of the 90's, if not the century.

I simply can't imagine why this terrific film is not available on DVD. If you like James Spader, and watch "Boston Legal", here is a chance to see him early on. This was one very, very, VERY strange film, with Spader and Mandy Patinkin, among others. "Darkly funny" many critics said; and it was indeed dark, and perhaps, wryly humorous. A wonderful, stark fable about freedom . . . ? Do not see it alone, gather a bunch of friends, and be prepared for a great discussion afterwards.

What a mysterious and subsuming story. This movie is so obscure and inconspicuous in its packaging it's lucky anyone has seen it at all. But I keep coming back to it. For me it begins with Mandy Pantinkin being such a subtle and sincere and moving actor. And his character, the way that he accepts his predicament and abstains from negativity, doing whatever his captors ask of him. And then his deep brooding silence late at night in the trailer. The obscurity of his background and his future. This is a very personal film to me. There is so much going on under the surface. And then James Spader, the somewhat shallow foil, but not insincere person, who is ultimately ruined by his inability to follow the rules. My only criticism is that there are too many loose ends toward the end of the picture. Somehow that doesn't lessen my opinion of the movie though. This one got me turned on to Paul Auster. I've now read several of his books and loved them.

A grubby Spader is barely recognizable and proves why Hollywood needs a B Movie Awards Show; he really excels as this seedy soul living hand-to-mouth. And who knew Mandy has all those muscles! I found this sparsely decorated movie intriguing. With hardly any budget spent on plot, costumes, or musical score, and all of it put into the actors, I HAD to learn what became of this pair. Spader and Mandy are the music and they're random meeting is the chance. Like a piece of music that saddens you, yet holds your attention, so is this little movie. It plays out like it plays out; like life plays out for each of us.
Movie Taster

Not for all tastes, this film combines the unique film making approach of Philip Haas (Angels and Insects) with a story by one of our most profoundly intellectual novelists of the 20th century, Paul Auster.

Dramatically understated, `The Music of Chance' chronicles one man's search (Mandy Patinkin plays Jim Nash) for himself, as he quits his job, loads his car and heads cross country. That his path crosses that of Jack Pozzi (James Spader) a drifter, card-sharp, down on his luck today, but eye's on the `big score' ahead, is not exactly unpredictable. What they encounter as a result is indeed surprising, as well as strenuous, and all together inappropriate to be delivered in the fantasy medium of film.

When I read the book, I stumbled over the text, the words weighing heavy on my being. Reading and rereading, the labor of the learning was far more than that which had yielded the purchase price.

Every twist and turn of the plot deals more multiple metaphor. Don't look to walk away from this one with a pleasant taste in your mouth, but you may find yourself a better person having watched it. Look for a Paul Auster cameo at the end.

(
First I saw the movie, and halfway through, it literally detonated in my head. It's a Freemasonic allegory! (And not exactly complimentary to Masonry, I might add, if I'm interpreting it correctly.) The masonic references are subtle (with the exception, of course, of the stone wall. 10,000 stones ain't exactly subtle <grin> but they tip you off to start looking elsewhere for clues.) I am not a Mason, but have read quite a bit about them, and our man Nashe (Wonder what Nagy means in Magyar?) is clearly a "traveling man", a man whose obligations (career,family) have fallen by the wayside (a favorite Auster motif), leaving him careening aimlessly, like a rogue pinball, from western city to western city who, as we meet him, is going "from the West to the East". (See the exchange between Michael Caine and Christopher Plummer on the train in "The Man Who Would Be King" if you don't believe me.) He picks up Pozzi, who has been "struck on the temple", just as Hiram Abiff was struck in the Masonic story of the events surrounding the building of the Temple of Solomon, and which is reenacted in ritual in the induction of every Master Mason. There are a number of other clever details such as the brand of champagne they drink with the hooker that just happens to be my old favorite "Veuve Cliquot". (It's too small to read on the film, but no other champagne has that distinctive orange label.) "Veuve" is French for Widow, and Masons often refer to each other as Sons of the Widow. The names of the two poker players, Flower and Stone, may refer to Rosicrucians and Freemasons, but their trip to France might refer to either Hugh De Payens and his pal's trip to see Bernard de Clairvoux (which kicked off the Templars, whom the Masons claim as ancestors), or perhaps Ben Franklin's (and friend?) trip to Paris where he was inducted into the French Lodge "Neuf Soeurs". They are many more (too many to mention here) and I still haven't cracked the whole thing (not being a Mason makes it a harder job), but the book fascinates me and I'll continue to dig. I've recently read Music of Chance, Moon Palace, and City of Glass, and will read the rest soon. This fellow is a joy to read, particularly for aficionados of the mystery genre, which he well knows how to seduce with his labyrinthine structures and metaphysical quandaries. He smacks of Miguel de Unamuno ("Niebla", "Fog" in English, I believe) and Jorge Luis Borges, the father of the metaphysical detective story (but whereas Borges' stories, much as I love them, are purely cerebral exercises, cold around the heart, and liberally sprinkled with red herrings as if to mock his readers, Auster's are anguished and emotionally involving), of the Pythagorean School (and its obsession with the relationship between music and mathematics) and the Priests of Heliopolis (whom I suspect they got it from), of drunken Phaeton and his wax wings and of the Minotaur in his Maze, of the poetry of Leonard Cohen and Lenny Bruce and Tony Curtis (who had his own brand of poetry, ask his women <grin>. I don't know if it's because this cat is my own age, or because I know his New York (before moving to Seattle), but I felt an instant kinship, like we'd read all the same books at some point.

NOTE TO THE AUTHOR:

If you read this, Mr. Auster, please drop me an email to either disabuse me of these notions or to confirm that I'm on the right track. In return, regardless of the answer, you have my word that I'll buy the rest of your books anyway, and that I won't abuse any email response, or ask you to autograph the books, or any such nonsense. I'm a stable, happily married chap with two kids and a small business, not a wacko or a literary groupie. Thanks for the ride, man, and keep 'em comin'!