5 Times Hollywood Overdid Casino Movies
Many people from Poland have tried out casino games because they first have seen it in a movie and wondered what it would be like to enter a casino and play. This does not come as a surprise as who wouldn’t want to learn how to play poker after seeing James Bond play? What doesn’t dream of executing a massive bluff calmly with a beautiful woman draped across your arm?
Guest author Jacek Michałski looks at five times Hollywood overdid casino movies.
Now if you have been gambling for a long time, you know these things don’t pan out exactly like how they are portrayed in the movies. Part of it is just that Hollywood sheen. Movies about plumbers don’t delve into the real nitty-gritty of actual plumbing, because no one else but plumbers would care about all those details.
Similarly, with gambling and casino movies, what is presented there as “gambling” is more like “Hollywood gambling”, which is a different beast altogether.
Exaggerations don’t really invalidate a great casino movie, even for dyed in the wool casino denizens. For most of us punters, it’s funny to spot errors that are obvious to us, but invisible to the greater population.
Here are five of the most egregious cases of Hollywood gambling in popular cinema.
1. Counting Cards Isn’t That Hard
One of the most influential movies about Blackjack is Rain Man, starring Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise. For most non-gamblers, Rain Man is known as the movie about counting cards.
In the film, Hoffman plays an autistic math genius who has a knack for crunching complex series of numbers to predict which card is going to come out of the casino shoe. Naturally, being able to predict the next card in a game such as Blackjack will net you a lot of money by allowing you to make perfect bets based on your fool-proof predictions.
In real life, counting cards isn’t that hard. You don’t have to be a math whiz of any sort to do it. All you need is patience and focus – it’s about as hard as learning how to do magic tricks.
The issue, though, is that most casinos ban the practice, and retain the right to boot you out of their premises as soon as they suspect you of employing it.
However, you don’t need to worry about card counting when you are playing at an online casino. Polish players can head over to Alf Casino and enjoy a great selection of slot games and table games in a safe and secure environment. While it is not as glamorous as a casino movie scene from Hollywood, you can still have a lot of fun and test out your luck factor.
2. Winning with a Better Poker Hand Doesn’t Always Correlate to Skill
While the skill aspect of playing poker is quite strong, there are rare instances where luck plays a decisive factor.
In cases where both players make strong hands, there comes a certain point where you simply cannot fold. Because if you fold extremely strong hands in fear of a nightmare scenario, you will end up losing money – either by others bluffing you relentlessly or by others folding to your bets, knowing that you are only betting with strong hands.
3. Bluffing Isn’t Necessary
In some table games, bluffing is treated as the most important part of the game. While bluffing is essential in the top levels of the game, you can comfortably play home poker games or low-stakes poker in casinos without needing to bluff even once.
The effectiveness of bluffing depends on the hand-reading skills of your opponent. If they can’t understand the story you are trying to tell with your bets, then bluffing is no better a strategy than flipping a coin to decide when to bet or check.
For most low-stakes poker games, just play tight, solid poker and you’ll be surprised how often you’ll be able to pick off bluffs from punters who watch too many poker movies.
4. Casino Games Involve Zero Skill
Games such as Roulette, Slots, Baccarat are all games of chance. There is no other way about it. You can be the smartest person in the world, and you will still lose heavily against the house in the long run, no matter how well-thought-out your betting system is.
Geniuses can do a lot of things, but they cannot alter the probabilities built into these casino games.
5. Problem Gambling Isn’t Romantic
Problem gambling is portrayed in many Hollywood movies in a morally damaging but still appealing way. Problem gamblers are drunks, running around in casinos with beautiful women, and burning cash.
In real life, problem gambling is much less romantically self-destructive. Unless you are a super high roller, problem gambling often means plunking down pennies on slots or other casino games without any joy.
They do not have a comely wife or girlfriend to complain about their gambling. It’s just a day after day of gambling without any benefit to themselves, their loved ones, or to society.
Conclusion
By all means, go out to a land-based casino or online casino in Poland and enjoy your favorite games. Just remember there is a big difference between reality and a Hollywood casino movie!
