  |
This article's content is marked as Mature The page contains mature content that may include coarse language, sexual references, strong drug use, extremely traumatic themes, and/or graphic violent images which may be disturbing to some. Mature pages are recommended for those who are 18 years of age and older. If you are 18 years or older or are comfortable with graphic material, you are free to view this page. Otherwise, you should close this page and view another page. |
|
| “ | When you love someone, you gotta trust them. There's no other way. You've got to give the key to everything that's yours. Otherwise, what's the point? And for a while, I believed that's the kind of love I had. | „ |
| ~ Ace in the opening scene. |
| “ | In the casino, the cardinal rule is to keep them playing and to keep them coming back. The longer they play, the more they lose, and in the end, we get it all. | „ |
| ~ Ace narrates his management in the Las Vegas casino business |
Samuel "Ace" Rothstein is the main protagonist of the 1995 crime film Casino. He is based on the real-life Las Vegas casino executive and Mafia associate, the late Frank Lawrence "Lefty" Rosenthal.
He was portrayed by Robert De Niro, who also played Vito Corleone in The Godfather Part II, Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver, Jimmy Conway in Goodfellas, Don Lino in Shark Tale, and Frank Sheeran in The Irishman.
History[]
Sam "Ace" Rothstein, a sports handicapper and Mafia associate, is sent to Las Vegas to run the Teamsters-funded Tangiers Casino on behalf of several Midwest Mob families - specifically for their gangland benefactor Remo Gaggi. Taking advantage of lax gaming laws allowing him to work at the casino while his gaming license is still pending, Ace becomes the Tangiers' de facto boss and doubles the casino's profits, which are skimmed by the Mob before the records are reported to income tax agencies. Impressed with Ace's work, the bosses send Ace's best friend, enforcer and caporegime Nicky Santoro, and his crew to protect Ace and the whole business. Nicky, however, begins to become more of a liability than an asset; his violent temper quickly gets him banned by the gaming board from every casino, and his name is placed in the black book. Nicky then gathers his own crew and begins running unsanctioned shakedowns and burglaries.
In the meantime, Ace meets and falls in love with a hustler named Ginger McKenna. Soon the pair conceive a daughter, Amy, and get married. At first Ace assures Ginger that he trusts her despite the latter's reluctance, but eventually their relationship starts to deteriorate as Ace begins to realize the extent of Ginger's true nature. This begins when Ace catches Ginger giving money to her former boyfriend, a con man named Lester Diamond, and later arranges for Nicky to have Lester beaten up in retribution.
Coincidentally, Ace crosses paths with Clark County Commissioner Pat Webb by firing Webb's son-in-law Donald Ward for incompetence and refusing to reinstate him. Webb soon retaliates by pulling Ace's casino license application from the backlog, forcing Ace to have a license hearing, while secretly arranging for the gaming board and State Senator Harrison Roberts to reject the license. Ace responds by appearing on television and openly accuses the city government of corruption. The bosses, unappreciative of Ace's publicity, ask him to return home, but he stubbornly blames Nicky's reckless lawbreaking for his own problems. In a heated argument in the desert, Nicky calls out Ace that without him he would not "exist" out in Las Vegas and chastises Ace to never "go over his head" again.
The bosses appoint Kansas City underboss Artie Piscano to oversee the skim and reduce the amount local mobsters are keeping for themselves, but he keeps incriminating ledgers and is caught on an FBI bug discussing the skim. Ace loses patience with Ginger after she and Lester are in Los Angeles with plans to run away to Europe with his daughter Amy. Ace talks Ginger into bringing Amy back, but Ginger's alcoholism and cocaine addiction anger him so much that he kicks her out of the house especially upon discovering her on the phone in the talks with somebody asking them to whack him. She returns, on Ace's condition that she carry a beeper on her for Ace to contact her whenever he must. Ginger turns to Nicky for help in getting her share of her and Ace's money from the bank, and they begin an affair. Ace reaches his limit with Ginger when she ties Amy to her bed to have a night with Nicky. Ace confronts Ginger in the restaurant and disowns her. She turns to Nicky, but he has washed his hands of her as well after he refuses to whack Ace for her. Fearing for her return and his life, Ace contacts Billy Sherbert and tells him to bring over his gun while having Amy stay with neighbors. The next morning, Ginger goes to Ace's house, creates a disturbance causing the cops to arrive at the house for noise disturbance and uses the distraction to take the key to their bank deposit box with the police following her. Upon finding out she stole the key from him he tries to get the bank to stop her but ends up following her down to the bank himself. She takes some of the savings, but she is then arrested by FBI agents.
With Ginger's arrest and the FBI's discovery of Piscano's records, which are then matched with the skimming operation, the casino empire crumbles and the bosses are arrested. During a meeting, they decide to eliminate anyone involved in order to keep them from testifying, including the head of the teamsters alongside it's money courier and several casino executives as well. Soon enough Ace is approached by federal agents who try to show him pictures of Nicky and Ginger's affair, but he refuses to look at them; Ginger eventually dies in Los Angeles of a drug overdose after becoming nearly penniless in the end.
Later on, Ace gets caught in a botched car bombing; he narrowly survives just in time and thereafter suspects Nicky was behind it. Before Ace can confront him, however, Nicky and his brother Dominick are whacked by their crew members led by Nicky's former right-hand man Frankie Marino; with the bosses finally having enough of Nicky's criminal shenanigans and also suspecting his role in Ace's car bombing incident.
With the Mob now out of power, the old casinos are purchased by big corporations and demolished to make way for gaudier gambling attractions financed by junk bonds. Ace laments that this new "family friendly" Las Vegas lacks the same kind of catering to the players as the older, classier Vegas he saw when he ran the Tangiers. In the final scene, an older Ace is shown living in San Diego, once again as a sports handicapper for the Mob, or in his words, "...right back where I started".
Trivia[]
- He and his real-life counterpart are known to be an control freak and micromanager. He managed his casino in every single details like criticizing the showgirl for their weights; scolding the dealers for not protecting his hands carefully or hilariously ordering the chef to put the equal amount of blueberries in every single muffins served in the casino.
Quotes[]
| “ | I'm not tryin' to tell you what to do. But you're way outta line Nick. What are you doin'? Where's your head? | „ |
| ~ Ace berating Nicky after he threatens the banker |
| “ | Looks bad? I'm gonna tell you what looks bad. Every time you're on television, I get mentioned. That looks bad. That looks bad. | „ |
| ~ Ace to Nicky about the publicity of their connection with each other |
| “ | All of a sudden you're the shoulder to cry on? Did you at least tell her about your little role in that whole situation? | „ |
| ~ Ace to Nicky after he told him that he made Ginger upset after he had Nicky's crew Lester Diamond beat up |
| “ | I want you to come with me now! Come with me now. Come with me now. | „ |
| ~ Ace to Ginger after she says she wants to whack him |
| “ | I want you out, I want you out of here I want you out of here!, I want you out of here! | „ |
| ~ Ace dragging Ginger to the wardrobe room after he finds out she was on the phone with someone asking them to have him whacked |
[]
 Villains
| ||
|
Chicago Outfit Other | ||