Today, millions of us play casino games online whenever we’re in the mood to do so.
It’s become as commonplace to play games like roulette, poker or baccarat as it is to play any other online games. The choice of online casino sites out there mean that we can all play whichever game we feel like, whenever we want to.
So it’s not too surprising that there’s already a movie about online gaming. Whether it will spawn a whole new lot of gamers, or put people off the idea, is yet to be seen!
The film is Runner Runner and it stars Ben Affleck and Justin Timberlake.
It was released this month in the States and didn’t do too well on its opening weekend – but it was opening against strong competition in the form of George Clooney’s latest film ‘Gravity’. Perhaps it may enjoy success further down the line as a bit of cult gamer film in the same way that Rounders (1998) – a movie all about underground poker games – has done.
Runner Runner is directed by Brad Furman and Leo Di Caprio is one of the producers. It’s a film that is all about online poker but is mainly shot in sunny Costa Rica. Why? This is where the film’s main character, Richie Furst (Justin Timberlake), heads to at the beginning of the story to confront an online gaming site owner, Ivan Block (Ben Affleck) as he believes he has the statistics to prove he has been beaten in an online poker game by a cheat on the site.
Furst is a Princeton student who has been funding his education by gambling online. Although he was threatened with being kicked off his course when he was caught gambling on campus, Furst decides to put everything he has left into one last game and then loses. So in desperation he goes to confront the website owner in Costa Rica in the hopes of getting his money back.
When he gets there, Block is dismissive and seems to brush Furst off, but the next day calls him up and offers him a job paying millions a year, which Furst takes, of course. He is quickly drawn into Block’s shady dealings and soon realizes he’s in a lot deeper than he thought.
It’s not long before he’s kidnapped by an FBI agent who wants to convict Block but can’t do anything legally as Costa Rica is out of his area of operations. Agent Shavers (played by Anthony Mackie) wants Furst to help him secure Block’s conviction. There are also the local Costa Rican officials to deal with. Alongside the main action, Furst falls in love with Block’s former girlfriend Rebecca (Gemma Arterton), so there’s also a bit of a love triangle plot thrown in.
There are plenty of twists and turns in the plot, with some gangster-style beatings and action thrown in for good measure, but critics have not been kind about Runner Runner so far, claiming that the talent in the film could have been used to create a much better movie. It’s one that you’ll have to see to decide for yourself.