A casino is a place to let loose and enjoy some excitement. It can be a place to play poker, blackjack or even try your luck at roulette. Usually casinos have flashy decor and upbeat music to create an energetic environment. There are also often places to eat and drink while playing. This can help to keep players at the tables longer and increase their chances of winning.
As a crime drama, Casino depicts a world of corruption and violence. The movie lays bare the intricate web that centered in Vegas at the time, with tendrils reaching into politicians, Teamsters unions and Chicago mafia members based out of Kansas City. Scorsese and co-writer Nicholas Pileggi drew upon the nonfiction book Casino: Love and Honor in Las Vegas to construct their story of greed, treachery, and murder.
In the movie, Ace Rothstein (Robert De Niro) is the casino’s reigning bettor extraordinaire. He has a strong worldview, however, which runs against the casino’s ethos of blind chance and trust. In one early scene, he watches the casino’s high-tech “eye-in-the-sky” surveillance system, which can be adjusted to target suspicious patrons.
Friedman’s design concept for casinos was based around getting people in and keeping them there. His theory was that if you have an idea of the time, you’ll realise you need to get food or the bathroom, and you will leave. Therefore, it is best to remove all indicators of time from the layout of the casino. This includes the bright lights, ‘penny-dropping’ slot noises (even though pennies stopped being used a long time ago) and even certain smells.
