Went to see the movie Mollie’s Game the other night. What a great story. Taken from the eponymous book, the ‘true’ story (ya never know how much is embellished with a flurry of ‘artistic license’) of Mollie Bloom, an ex-olympic skier who ended up running massive, high-stakes poker games in LA and New York. An American Story, logical progression from Free-style skiing to poker pimp. Gambling is illegal in both LA and New York, except in ‘private’ games. So as long you don’t get paid or ‘take a cut’, facilitating 10 guys (all guys, I’m not, in this instance, being sexist) to win/lose a couple of million dollars is perfectly fine and acceptable. And the winners gave her ‘tips’. Thousands and thousands of bucks. As big winners would. So far so legal. She declared her taxes and paid her dues. And lived like a queen. But then late in her career she started ‘charging’ a percentage of winnings, to cover her expenses, and that is a serious red line over there. In England Mollie’s Game wouldn’t have been a story. She’d never have been arrested by the FBI. In part because we don’t have them here, but also because its not illegal to do anything relating to gambling here. They advertise it on the tv over the entire sporting weekend. But Mollie ended up in court. Otherwise there’d have been no role for Idris Elba who played her lawyer.

Jessica Chastain plays Mollie. She is totally captivating. Sharp-tongued, quick-witted and much cleverer than everyone else. Or perhaps that was Mollie. Hard to see the line. Which is what being a good actor is all about, I s’pose. But as well as the great acting and powerful performance, Jessica looks simply stunning. She is the centre of the screen, wherever she is. She has that almost ‘old world’ kind of ‘screen siren’ look of the old Hollywood greats. A smile 7 miles wide filled with 276 gleaming teeth. The hair, the make-up… she got me, I was drawn to her light. Which is very bright. Bit like Lila.

Meanwhile Paul Pogba is taking flack at Man United for being a lummox on Wednesday night. Didn’t track back when Spurs attacked, couldn’t handle Moussa Dembele (few can when he’s fit) and generally being what we know him to be. A rather lazy but incredibly gifted football player. What could be termed a ‘luxury’ player. So is it his fault that as a central midfielder he failed in his responsibilities? Or the (miserable, whining, blame-throwing, Portuguese) manager’s fault for playing him in the wrong position?

Only time, and possibly trophies, will tell.

Happy Friday

A xxxx