Atlantic City

Atlantic City is being demolished; the old hotels are coming down and casinos are going up in their place. Lou is old, a numbers runner who describes himself as a man who was once somebody in the mob. Sally lives across the way, taking classes to become a casino dealer, and every evening she washes at the kitchen sink with lemons to get the smell of fish off her hands. Lou watches her through the window. When Sally's estranged husband turns up with stolen cocaine, Lou gets into something genuinely dangerous for the first time in his life. Louis Malle directed from a screenplay by John Guare. Burt Lancaster plays Lou and Susan Sarandon plays Sally. The lemon scene is the film's most remembered image, and because it is tied to Lou watching from his window it manages to be uncomfortable as well. It was nominated in all five major Academy Award categories: Picture, Director, Actor, Actress and Original Screenplay. It won none of them. Who it is for: viewers who like films about ageing, self-deception and cities that are falling down. Who it is not for: anyone expecting a crime picture. The plot is thin and what the film really cares about is the lies these two tell each other.