"Atlantic City" has a lot of good acting but I sure found it to be a thoroughly unpleasant film. You've got an aging petty crook (Burt Lancaster),a drug dealing user, a doormat of a woman (Susan Sarandon),her bizarre and spacey sister and a nasty old lady with an equally nasty dog--all of which are hard to care in the least about and one who is just thoroughly despicable. Throw them into a thoroughly seedy and run-down environment and you've got a film that I found oppressively awful and hard to watch or care about in any way. Obviously I am not the voice of everyone, as the film received five Oscar nominations--though I really cannot see why. For me to enjoy a film, in most cases I need to have SOMEONE that I can relate to or care about, but in this film there wasn't even one. By the time it was all over, I just felt I needed a bath and never wanted to see this film again.

In his fourth Academy Award nominated role Burt Lancaster essays the role of Lou Pasco, low level numbers runner and guardian and service provider to Kate Reid, a former gangster's moll from the old days. As you might have reasonably guessed from the title role this all takes place in Atlantic City which in 1980 was undergoing a rebirth.

The one time resort town was undergoing a face-lift when this film takes place. Legalized gambling was coming in and a lot of the old town was being torn down to make room for spanking new casinos.

Burt's story parallels that of Susan Sarandon who is working in one of the hotel buffet lines and also going to school to learn to be a dealer when new casinos do finally open up. They live in adjoining buildings.

But like the proverbial bad penny her husband Robert Joy shows up with a pregnant Holly McLaren. Joy has stolen a nice little package of heroin from the mob and he's looking to make a quick sale. He brings Lancaster into the deal, but manages to get himself killed in the process.

That forces Lancaster and Sarandon into an alliance of convenience, but who would think at Burt's age and he was 76 when he made Atlantic City, he'd find love as well. Both Lancaster and Sarandon are so good as players they don't look foolish in the romance department.

And after over 30 years in the lower levels of the underworld, Burt finally makes his bones. It's a surprise unto himself.

Atlantic City was shot in Atlantic City, an Atlantic City we'll not see any more because it's now looking so different than what you're seeing in this film. Some interior stuff was shot in Montreal and the film wrapped on the last day of 1980 and released in 1981.

Atlantic City got Oscar nominations for Lancaster and for Susan Sarandon and both ran up against On Golden Pond and lost to Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn. Director Louis Malle and the film itself were up as well, but lost to Warren Beatty for Reds and Chariots of Fire for Best Film. Chariots of Fire writer Colin Welland also beat writer John Guare for Best Original Screenplay. Five nominations, but not a winner for any of the categories.

Still Atlantic City has become a minor classic and it did revive the career of Burt Lancaster somewhat. Lancaster was aging and he knew it. He transitioned nicely into character parts in his last productive decade as a result of Atlantic City.

Not a bad reason for him to take this film assignment.

Though this movie isn't earth shattering, it's rather memorable, where we two great actors strut their stuff. I remember seeing this 30 years ago, where it made more of an impression on me back then. It's the luckless characters that make it work, Lancaster in particular of course, seamless, as a small time hood, who runs a lucrative numbers racket, who dreams of much greater success, and notoriety, being matched with those famous hoods, where at times, you wonder if truths are lies. He also makes money, looking after and servicing a bed ridden, old, and once beautiful starlet, showgirl (the unforgettable Kate Reid). The movie starts off wonderfully where an enterprising, yet ill fortunate, training croupier, Sarandon, is baring some of herself, you might say (slicing lemon have never been sexier). She's the apple of Lancaster's eye, where the two meet merely at Lancaster's welcome fortune and blessing, after her former loser/scumbucket hubby, a younger and different looking Robert Joy (the deformed looking guy in Land Of The Dead, and Hills Have Eyes remake) buys the farm. AC is memorable like I said, but isn't something really special, where if looking at in another way, it is. However it's entertaining and rewarding, thanks to the great cast, Joy, another memorable standout, Reid, the biggest, while the always ever smiling Al Waxman, was a likable card playing hood (he was the pudgy detective in Class Of 1984) and only appears briefly here in a couple of scenes. The movie is also memorable for the great photography and use of locations, where to me, Atlantic City is like a Miami Dive, where 20 to 30 years, before the point of the story, it would of been something different. But the most memorable scene here, was that one shot of that big casino building, crumbling down, and reduced to nothing more than rubble. Also, that unforgettable line with Lancaster and Sarandon check into that hotel, near ending, both you'll see in the preview to this. The title song is those that will ring in your head too. Catch that in the preview as well.