In Las Vegas, unlucky Bernie Lootz works at the Shangri-La casino as a "cooler" - a man with near-professional bad luck, his presence at a casino designed to stop people from winning. A cocktail waitress, Natalie, takes no real notice of Bernie, who is smitten with her. The casino manager and partner, Shelly, prides himself on running a "classically" Las Vegas casino, and resents the new establishments that attract a lower clientele. The owners, however, hire an advisor named Larry to help bring in more money with techniques contrary to Shelly's outdated policies. Bernie informs Shelly that he is leaving town in a week.
After an encounter during which Bernie rescues Natalie from an aggressive customer, she appears to take an interest in him. Eager to prevent Bernie from leaving the casino, Shelly secretly prods Natalie into asking him out for a drink. They end up sleeping together, after which Natalie takes a genuine interest in Bernie. Although they begin seeing each other, Bernie is apprehensive due to his mostly bad luck. He reveals to Natalie that he used to be a gambling addict and was in huge debt to several casinos; Shelly "saved" him by breaking his kneecap and paying off his debts in exchange for Bernie's work as a cooler for six years, which ends at the end of the week. By accident, the couple run into Bernie's estranged son Mikey and his pregnant wife Charlotte, who are scamming a diner by faking labor. Bernie tells Mikey to stop by the casino sometime.
Bernie is happy with his new relationship and his "cooling" abilities fade, much to Shelly's anger. Mikey and Charlotte come by the motel and Bernie gives them $3,000, but Natalie is skeptical of Charlotte's behavior. When Bernie reveals to Natalie he intends to leave Vegas, she initially says she won't go with him and Bernie is upset. When Bernie fails to cool Mikey at the craps table, Shelly realizes he is being cheated by Mikey. Shelly takes Mikey and Charlotte downstairs and his crew begins beating Mikey. Bernie then promises to pay the $150,000 Mikey was up, but Shelly breaks Mikey's hand and punches Charlotte, revealing her pregnancy was being faked anyway. Though distraught, that night Natalie and Bernie confess their love for one another, and Bernie again becomes a good luck charm.
Shelly calls Natalie to his office and reminds her that he hired her to date Bernie so he wouldn't leave Vegas, not to fall in love with him, which has made him both happy and lucky. He forces her to leave town abruptly, which hurts Bernie and ruins his luck. Natalie does truly love Bernie, though, and returns, thus restoring Bernie's luck. Shelly goes to Bernie's motel room and begins packing for Natalie. Arguing, Shelly slaps Natalie thus knocking her face into a mirror which shatters and leaves her severely cut up. After a tense exchange wherein she claims Bernie is the closest thing Shelly has to a friend and he doesn't want him to leave, he simply leaves her there. When Bernie comes home, she reveals Shelly hired her to pretend to like him, but she truly fell in love with him. Bernie take Natalie to the hospital emergency room after which he consoles her over her injured face.
Banking on his good luck brought on by Natalie's devotion, Bernie confronts Shelly and calls him a coward with nothing in his life but the casino. Shelly lets him go on the condition he pay back the $150,000, which Bernie tries to win at craps. Larry wants Shelly to stop Bernie’s hot streak, but Shelly takes him into the men’s room and beats him, breaking his hand. Bernie leaves, and he and Natalie drive away from Vegas. He pulls over and reveals that he won a lot of money, but a cop presumably sent by Larry approaches and readies to kill them. Meanwhile, Shelly gets in his car and finds his partner waiting for him. On Larry's behalf, he murders Shelly, saying they have to protect their interests. A drunk driver accidentally hits and kills the cop and Bernie remarks it was freaky luck, a freaky accident. Larry meets with investors as new director of casino operations and toasts a very bright future. Bernie and Natalie shown driving off into desert leaving a casino billboard behind them.
Michelle Lopez as The Red Headed Craps Player "cooled" by Bernie
Timothy Landfield as The Player
Production
Though The Cooler is set near Fremont Street in Las Vegas, it was mainly filmed in Reno at the Golden Phoenix Reno over the course of three weeks.[3] Golden Phoenix Reno casino employees and Reno locals were used extensively in the filming of The Cooler. The Golden Phoenix Hotel Casino is now a completed condominium project called The Montage.[4] The hotel buildings demolished during the closing credits are the Aladdin, the Sands, the Landmark, and the Dunes hotels.
In an episode of the Sundance Channel series Anatomy of a Scene, director Wayne Kramer and members of his cast and crew discussed various aspects of The Cooler.[5] In order to show Bernie's evolution from loser to winner, costume designer Kristin M. Burke dressed him in suits and clothes that progressively became better fits. Early in the film, the character resembles a boy dressed in his father's oversized clothing. By the end, Bernie is not only wearing the right size suit, but he has accessorized it with a brightly colored shirt and tie that represent his sunnier disposition. Lighting schemes designed by cinematographer Jim Whitaker also contributed to documenting Bernie's progression. In early scenes, his face is kept in the shadows, but later he is filmed in a spotlight and backlit to make him stand out from everything behind him.
With an estimated budget of $4 million, The Cooler grossed $8,291,572 in the United States and $2,173,216 in foreign markets for a total worldwide box office of $10,464,788.[2]
The film received generally positive reviews from critics, with considerable praise for Alec Baldwin's performance. On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 77% based on 174 reviews, with an average rating of 6.8/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "A small movie elevated by superb performances."[12] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 69 out of 100 based on 36 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[13]
Writing for The New York Times, A. O. Scott said, "The setting ... is a little tired, and the premise is pretty hokey. Mr. Kramer, rather than trying to discover anything new, is content to recycle familiar characters and story lines. The script ... and the direction are skillful, if occasionally gimmicky ... Luckily this picture is rescued from cliché by the quality of the acting, and Mr. Kramer wisely gives the actors room to work."[14]
Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times said the film "has a strange way of being broad and twisted at the same time, so that while we surf the surface of the story, unexpected developments are stirring beneath ... This is a movie without gimmicks, hooks or flashy slickness ... The acting is on the money, the writing has substance, the direction knows when to evoke film noir and when ... to get fancy."[15]
In Rolling Stone, Peter Travers rated the film three and a half out of a possible four stars and added, "Wayne Kramer, who co-wrote the scrappy script with Frank Hannah, makes a potent directing debut and strikes gold with the cast... Top of the line is Baldwin, whose revelatory portrayal of an old Vegas hard-liner in thrall to the town's faded allure is the stuff Oscars are made of. From James Whitaker's seductive camerawork to Mark Isham's lush score, The Cooler places all the smart bets and hits the jackpot."[16]
Mark Holcomb of The Village Voice said, "Taking a page from the Sin City cinema revisionist's handbook, The Cooler mimics the Vegas insider's perspective of Casino (without Scorsese's fetishistic attention to detail), the seedy/saccharine insouciance of FX's Lucky (devoid of quirky chutzpah), and the couch-potato glitz of NBC's Las Vegas ... What's left never gels as fantasy, drama, or romantic comedy... [the] film never amounts to more than a cute idea stretched to poker-chip thinness."[17]
