The King of Marvin Gardens

David Staebler hosts a late-night radio show in Philadelphia where he tells his own life story, and how much of it is true is never clear. His brother Jason calls him to Atlantic City. Jason has a plan: buy an island near Hawaii and put a casino on it. There is no money, the partners are dangerous, and David knows it will not work, but he stays. The film is not a con story. It is about who needs which story. Jason lives by talking and David by listening, both inside their own inventions, and the real move is the way the roles swap by the end. The street in the title comes from the Monopoly board, and the game analogy is never explained. Bob Rafelson directed. Jack Nicholson plays David, the quiet brother, Bruce Dern plays the talker Jason, and Ellen Burstyn is Sally, Jason's steadily unravelling girlfriend. Laszlo Kovacs shot it. It was filmed in off-season Atlantic City with empty hotels and a closed pier. The city's casino era had not yet begun, and that emptiness is on screen. It opens on a long unbroken monologue Nicholson delivers straight to camera. Who it is for: anyone who likes seventies American cinema and Nicholson when he plays quiet. Who it is not for: anyone expecting the story to advance. The film is deliberately flat, the middle drags, and the ending arrives with no warning.