“Hey. You look in the mirror, you don't like what you see, don't believe it.”
Bernie (William H Macy) to an emotionally and physically battered Natalie (Mario Bello)
The cinematic realm in melodrama often works on levels. What is being depicted as the forbidden cannot be overtly spoken of, often due to strict censorship. Melodrama utilizes what is unsaid to the audience, through a series of gestures, moments and sensation.
Take for example The Cooler (2003) in which William H Macy plays an unlikely romantic lead. Macy whom is often typecast in Hollywood as a sympathetic failure plays Bernie Lootz (lose) a man out of luck in love and life. He is a professional loser and wanders his neon lit world spreading his supposed bad luck on the high rollers in an old fashioned Las Vegas Casino owned by the dominating and brutal Shelley Kaplow, played by a threatening Alec Baldwin.
Las Vegas
Las Vegas is an immoral world of greed, lust and fantasy and discontented Bernie is on his way out despite Shelley’s disapproval. In a desperate attempt to keep Bernie, Shelly solicits for Natalie (Maria Bello) to befriend the hapless Bernie and they fall in love. The love story is one level of the melodrama. The second level is the threat to the love story poised by Shelly as their love is forbidden by him.
Please note there are spoilers ahead in this article.
Bernie embodies internal suffering, he is divorced and his only son returns back in his life much to his liking only to cheat him. Shelly himself is at an internal crisis, he is the tragic figure, unable to adapt to the faster, younger and richer generation hungry for his power and position. Shelly also loses his friend, Buddy (Paul Sorvino) to the excess’ of drugs, both physically and mentally. Shelly is an old figure trying to remain successful in a brazen new world.
Natalie longs for a child and to be in love, this is unsaid but seen as she often lingers wide-eyed at children. Initially her motivation is to keep Shelly content by stringing Bernie along only she falls in love and struggles to tell Bernie the truth and physically struggles as Shelly reacts in violence due to the formation of love between the two luckless individuals.
Luck and Love
The conclusion of the film sees Shelly murdered by the investors who want his casino and Bernie and Natalie, foolishly in love they are happier and wealthier if not a little bruised and battered. The space of innocence is shared between Bernie and Natalie, while Shelly is the traditional villain as his personal struggle is belittled by his diminutive stature, foul mouth, brute exterior and unjust treatment of Bernie and Natalie.
The film does not pretend to be anything more then a romantic drama set in a fantastical world and is at times self-referential suggesting its only a film, for example Natalie’s surprise at her instant riches due to Bernie’s good-luck “I thought that only happened in the movies”.
Vanessa Appassamy - Vanessa Claire Appassamy is an established freelance writer and researcher who has been awarded a Master of Arts (Research), Bachelor of ...
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