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Il cartaio (2004) More at IMDbPro »

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15 out of 18 people found the following comment useful :-
Better than expected, 17 August 2004
6/10
Author: jhs39 from Chicago, IL

Dario Argento's new thriller about a serial killer who forces the police to play video poker against him in order to save the lives of women he has kidnapped doesn't rank with the director's best work, but it is fast paced and entertaining if you aren't expecting too much.

After the disastrous Phanton of the Opera Argento made Sleepless, which was a self-conscious attempt to duplicate the success of his 1970's giallos, down to giving long defunct group Goblin credit for the soundtrack. Sleepless was certainly watchable, but it felt more like an Argento rip-off by an inferior director rather than the real thing, like the master had somehow turned into Antonio Bido or Luigi Cosi.

This time around Argento makes a movie that is less obviously grounded in his own previous success--The Card Player is far more generic than Sleepless, but since Argento isn't trying so hard to recapture past magic the film tends to work much better.

Unfortunately plotting and characterization have always been his achilles heel. Classic Argento films are about set-pieces and style, not plot. Stendhal Syndrome suffered because it turned into a character driven psychological thriller, which didn't play to his strengths as a filmmaker. The Card Player is largely plot-driven, lacking the stylistic flourishes and memorable set-pieces that defined his classic films and also offset his weaknesses as a writer. The Card Player generally feels like a made for TV crime thriller or even a pilot for a potential television show.

But while The Card Player isn't great or even mildly believable it is pretty fun on a cheesy B movie level, and the finale involving a handcuff key, a racing train and a lap-top manages to capture the delirious goofiness that came easily to the director back when he made Phenomena and Deep Red. It's not hard to imagine Argento giggling when he came up with his climactic scene and the sense of fun is infectious.

Most fans have probably accepted by now that Dario Argento isn't the filmmaker he was twenty years ago and that he will likely never make another classic thriller, but The Card Player is at least good enough not to disappoint, given the lowered expectations that now inevitably greet one of his movies. For me this was easily his best since Trauma. It also offers reason for optimism: Sleepless was a huge improvement over Phantom of the Opera and The Card Player is better than Sleepless, giving fans a reason to look forward to his next film.

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15 out of 19 people found the following comment useful :-
Not as bad as people say, 22 January 2004
7/10
Author: Michael Mackenzie (whiggles@ntlworld.com) from Glasgow, Scotland

After getting almost unanimously negative reviews, I was dreading watching IL CARTAIO. It turns out that the film is not bad at all. No, it's not another SUSPIRIA, but nor is it a PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, thankfully. People keep going on about the absence of Argento's trademark style. Well, I want to know what style that would be? Suspiria's? Phenomena's? The Stendhal Syndrome's? I think you get my point. Argento doesn't have one single style -- he had many, and I think that Il Cartaio's style is different rather than absent. I personally liked the camerawork and the cold look of the film. The use of shadow is really good, and I think this has got to be the only film Argento has done that is obviously set in the winter. It gave everything an eery look.

It's a tightly constructed little thriller with a lot of very tense set-piece scenes. The lack of gore confused me a bit, but everyone seems to forget the impalement of a certain character. That, to me, was pretty gory although admittedly not flamboyant. In many ways it seems a lot like the antithesis of Non Ho Sonno, which was extremely over the top in terms of violence.

I think Tenebre was the last film Argento did that received almost unanimous critical acclaim on its initial release. All of his other triumphs since then have grown on people over the years. I don't think Il Cartaio will be any different.

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9 out of 11 people found the following comment useful :-
A different Argento, to be sure, but that's not bad Argento!, 2 April 2004
6/10
Author: jangu from Stockholm, Sweden

I have read the reviews complaining about that Dario has abandoned his style and all the gore to produce a tame TV-thriller. Far from the truth, according to me! I really think that this is the best he has done since "Opera". Granted, his stylish touch might seem to be muted compared to the baroque thriller of the 70s and 80s, but this cold and bleak atmosphere that he conjures up this time along with very brightly lit camera-work for most of the scenes, is something I enjoyed throughout! Sure, the gore is almost totally absent (apart from one scene), but as a whole this picture is much more efficiently done. The pace is fluent and unlike most of his other movies, there is actually no point where the characters just stand around and talk (and sometimes his players have been involved in some truly atrocious conversation) to fill out the time.

*MINOR SPOILER* And in "Il cartaio" the three main actors are actually very good! They are people you can care about and when they are in danger or die, you feel sorry for them. *END OF SPOILER* Like I mentioned before, I enjoyed the bleak look of the movie...as always classy camera-work in every frame of an Argento picture! And Claudio Simonetti's score is his best in years even though you might be just a little bit tired of it by the time the movie reaches it's conclusion. And talking about the finale, I found it both interesting, but at the same time also maybe a little bit of a letdown. However, the endings have been a bit weak lately in Dario's films. Not since "Tenebrae" has there been a really powerful conclusion. And two minor complaints finally...it was too easy to guess who the killer was. This has been mentioned before and I think it is true. The killer's identity could have been better camouflaged without a "certain scene" (you will know which one). And the card scenes went on too long on two occasions. The constant screaming from the victims became annoying in these scenes and I almost wanted them to die just to make them shut up! Otherwise, his best work in years and a film where he is not just content with repeating an old formula (like in "Sleepless" which I liked anyhow), but is actually trying to find a whole new path in his art.

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4 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
Not bad at all: little gore but plenty of tension, 7 February 2004
8/10
Author: Shusai from Brisbane, Australia

I have the good fortune to be working in Italy now and, as Dario Argento is my favorite filmmaker, I saw 'Il Cartaio' as soon as it came out here. Like 'Nonhosonno' it's a tense, unnerving urban thriller with a number of flaws but enough sublime moments to make it stand out above pretty much everything else playing at the moment. Gorehounds will be disappointed though, as 'Cartaio' eschews the over-the-top bloodshed of almost every previous Argento film. But most giallo buffs should find plenty of nerve-wracking thrills and intriguing plot twists to hold their attention.There are also sympathetic characters and great location-shooting in Rome.

I enjoyed Simonetti's electronic score, although I felt it was slightly overused in the second half of the film. It sets the scene nicely during the opening credits and is used to great effect in the 3rd murder sequence, a truly tense scene which really had my pulse-rate running! On the subject of the murder sequences, they rely on suggestion rather than visceral impact, but are mostly effective for the electrifying and perverse tension they exude. Of the numerous killings, two of the poker-game sequences (the second and the fourth) went on for too long and the victims' shrill screams started to get annoying.The other murders, though, were wonderfully timed and quite shocking, especially since the characters are surprisingly sympathetic and better-developed than in many other Argento films. Argento has never used such a minimalist approach before, and in my opinion it works, because when those creepy camera movements, stylistic flourishes, and visual enigmas do actually occur, they have all the more impact. I'm happy to see that Argento is continuing to mature and metamorphose as a film maker. But I also admit a desire that he'll return to the all-out gory shocks and high-baroque style of his earlier masterpieces. I give 'Il Cartaio' an 8/10, just below 'Nonhosonno'.

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2 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
THE CARD PLAYER (Dario Argento, 2004) **1/2, 6 May 2006
5/10
Author: MARIO GAUCI (marrod@melita.com) from Naxxar, Malta

I was among those who felt that Argento lost his touch after TENEBRAE (1982), and that his output during the last 20 years or so was just a pale shadow of his best work (with the truly lamentable 1998 version of THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA being the worst of all). While all these films contained some interesting elements, they failed to jell into a satisfying whole; the same, therefore, can be said of his latest offering.

THE CARD PLAYER was originally intended as a sequel to THE STENDHAL SYNDROME (1996), which had starred the director's talented daughter Asia: however, in the interim she had turned her attention to directing small, personal films and at the time of the proposed shooting was staying in the U.S.; so, the lead character's name and background had to be slightly changed to accommodate a new actress – Stefania Rocca. Unfortunately, the days when Argento's unique visual style was alone worth the price of admission are long gone and, despite a few distinct touches here and there (with the best sequence being when Rocca is stalked at night by the killer in her own house), THE CARD PLAYER looks – and feels – distressingly like the typical made-for-TV movie that fills up the tube's schedule in Italy virtually every week (the fact that the film is considerably less gory than his earlier stuff, with the majority of the murders taking place off-screen, or that none of the cast members other than Rocca herself are well-known, let alone overseas, only adds to this impression)! At least, regular collaborators Claudio Simonetti (music score) and Sergio Stivaletti (make-up effects) are on hand to offer their consistently reliable input…

Anyway, the cat-and-mouse thriller plot (once one gets over the silly premise that the Police would accept the challenge of a poker game with the killer, even if the prize is the life of a hostage) is intriguing and compelling enough for the most part – but characterization is alarmingly shoddy (despite its attempt to create a romantic situation between Rocca and Liam Cunningham, the latter sent by the British Embassy in Rome to investigate the murders), while the eventual revelation and subsequent climax involving a speeding train are quite a disappointment (though, from what little I recall of Argento's later work, at least OPERA [1987] and SLEEPLESS [2001] were also given lame endings)!

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3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
Yeah, it's alright...., 16 August 2006
6/10
Author: Pet_Rock from United States

Of course it's not Dario's best, but it's not his worst. I give it a 5.5, leaning more on the 6 side.

Anna Mari (Taras Kostyuk) is a policewoman working with an Irish policeman (Liam Cunningham) and a young poker champ (Silvio Muccino) to catch a killer who kills his young female victims if the police loose a game of video poker.

This movie seems like an okay mix of "Silence of the Lambs", "Saw 2", and "CSI".

The music, like in all of Darios films, is great. The look of the dead bodies are also fantastic and spooky.

However, Phoebe Scholfield and Jay Benedict (both first time writers) did a horrible job of the dialogue. In fact, I didn't like most of the writing. It was confusing at times but as long as you don't think too deep into it, you can enjoy this as a neat little screaming-and-crying-girl flick with great special effects and so-so kills. They're so-so because most of them are offscreen and similar, but towards the end they get great and unique.

So you could easily enjoy this if you just want to pass the time, but don't expect another Argento classic.

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3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
And I had such high hopes for this one, 25 August 2005
5/10
Author: bensonmum2 from Tennessee

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

A deranged serial killer wants to play a game of internet poker with the police. But the stakes are very high. If the police win, the woman he has kidnapped goes free. If the killer wins, the captive dies. It's up to an Italian policewoman and an Irish agent to stop this high-tech killer before anymore young women die.

What Works:

- Set pieces. I have seen even the most ardent Argento critics admit that the worst of his movies have some nice set pieces. Argento's problem has always been stringing these set pieces together into a coherent story. While I could cite several examples, one set piece in The Card Player that really stands out is the scene where the killer is hiding in the policewoman's house. It's suspenseful and very nicely done.

- Nasty deaths. Although most of the actual scenes of murder take place off screen, we are treated to the nasty aftermath. The scenes of the police poking the murdered bodies in the morgue are as gruesome as you'll see. Especially when one of the bodies "fights" back. Eeeewwww.

- Acting. The two leads (Stefania Rocca and Liam Cunningham) are excellent. Both came across as believable and sometimes that's all you need. Plus, the chemistry between the two was very good. I could actually see the two of them together as a couple. It wasn't forced as is so often the case.

What Doesn't Work:

- Contrived Plot. Too often, The Card Player relies on the most unrealistic coincidences to advance the plot. It's as if the planets line-up just right for the killer to do and get away with the things he does. For example, in one scene, the killer uses a woman to lure a poker expert into a trap. The problem is that the man must follow the woman over what seems like half of Italy until he arrives at just the right spot before the killer springs into action. How does the killer know the poker guy will follow the woman that far? What if he tires of the chase and calls it quits? What if he meets another woman and goes with her? It felt too contrived to me to be believable.

- Acting. As good as the two leads are, much of the rest of the cast is terrible. I don't know if it's more a function of poor dubbing than it is actual acting ability, but the supporting cast doesn't come across very well. Some of the police captain's top assistants are about as convincing as the Three Stooges (not to mention they come across like the Three Stooges).

- The Poker Expert. The police captain's daughter has been kidnapped and could very well be the next victim. The police desperately need a poker expert to increase their odds of winning the game of online poker. Do they turn to a well-known, renowned poker player? Do they turn to a mathematician to assist in determining probabilities in poker? Heck, do they even seek out an someone with half a brain? The answer: No! Instead, the police put the fate of the kidnapped women in the hands of a brainless punk who plays video poker for pocket change.

Argento's The Card Player is a real hit or miss proposal. While Argento again shows his skill with set pieces and is blessed with some good acting, there are too many plot points that don't make much sense or are too far-fetched for me to rate The Card Player any higher.

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3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
Another dud from Dario, 26 June 2005
4/10
Author: burrobaggy from Newcastle, home of footie

It's sad when influential talents go off the boil, but everything Argento has done since Tenbrae seems to have shown all the signs of a filmmaker who has lost interest but still has bills to pay. On the good side this is nowhere near as bad as Phantom of the Opera or Phenomena. Nor is it as mediocre as The Stendahl Syndrome or Trauma - it just aspires to be that mediocre.

Sleepless might have been a minor comeback - silly but with good set-pieces - but any ground gained is immediately lost with this tepid misfire. Low on gore, low on style, low on character, it's really just an outline for a movie that he hasn't bothered to fill in. Psycho killer kidnaps women and forces female cop with issues to play internet poker for their lives. Fill in the blanks film-making ensues, very dull for the first 80 minutes, almost interesting in the last twenty. But you don't need to see this film. It won't offend, it'll just bore.

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4 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :-
A bit disappointing, 26 July 2004
Author: Petros Rodakinias from Volos, Greece

What can I say about this film? It certainly is not a typical Argento film (and I mean that in a very broad sense - there are some things you expect from an Argento film, like gore, tension and a certain visual style), but is it really bad? Well, it's not a terrible movie but from the man that gave us Suspiria, Deep Red and Tenebrae I expected much more.

First of all it's not giallo but more of a run of the mill detective story. Now, this wouldn't be bad if it was a good detective story, but it's not. The identity of the killer was predictable and some parts of the story did not make any sense. On top of that, the acting was not very good and the music was at best tolerable. And the final scene was just bad and did not make much sense.

The only good things about the movie were some great shots of Rome, and a couple of good, powerful scenes (like the first 2 murders) that reminded me a little of Argento's better films.

It's not a very bad movie, it's just a mediocre one. But since it's an Argento movie I expected much more. I give it 5 out of 10.

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5 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
Flawed, Inconsistent and Disappointing for a Dario Argento's Movie, 26 September 2007
6/10
Author: Claudio Carvalho from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

In Rome, after the abduction of a British tourist, the police inspector Anna Mari (Stefania Rocca) is contacted by the criminal, who self-entitles The Card Player, challenging the police department to dispute a video poker with him where the prize would be the life of the victim. The Chief of Police refuses to participate and the victim is tortured and killed in front of an internet web cam. The British detective John Brennan (Liam Cunningham) is assigned to investigate the case and when another woman is kidnapped, they invite the addicted player Remo (Silvio Muccino) to play for the police. Anna and John lead the investigation trying to disclose who might be the serial-killer.

In a condition of fan of Dario Argento, I am completely disappointed with "The Card Player". The screenplay is silly, full of clichés and plot holes, there are some terrible support actors and I do not understand why the DVD is dubbed in terrible English, without the option of the original language. The biggest holes are: (1) the motives for the serial-killer to torture, kill, play card and provoke the police are never explained, and the only justification that the murderer gives is that he loves Anna. (2) How could be a tape of the game, if the other player selects the card to hold and to discard? How could the maniac anticipate the movements and have the timing of the opponent? Sorry, but it is impossible and not feasible. The gorgeous Stefania Rocca and Liam Cunningham have good performance, but unfortunately Dario Argento was careless and lazy with his story and script. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Jogador Misterioso" ("Mysterious Player")

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