'EVEN MONEY' DOESN'T KNOW WHEN TO FOLD 'EM.

Byline: Bob Strauss

Film Critic

'Even Money" is pretty much just that: not too dull but not real interesting.

It's an ensemble piece about gambling that aspires to both film noir suspensefulness and instructive insight into a life-destroying addiction. The players are passionate enough, but they can't overcome a sense of dramatic deja vu -- made extra irksome by the fact that another underwhelming gambling movie, "Lucky You," came and went two weeks ago. There are some compelling moments in this one, but the odds are against it leaving any strong impressions.

Kim Basinger, Tim Roth and Jay Mohr are the standout performers as, respectively, a blocked novelist who has lost her family's savings at the slots, a sadistic point man for a crime boss who may or may not exist, and a middle-class bookie who hates using violence to collect because it makes his acid reflux flare up.

Less enchanting roles include Danny DeVito's washed-up but still hustling casino magician; an uncharacteristically overacting Forest Whitaker as an indebted handyman who tries to get his beloved NBA prospect brother (Nick Cannon) to throw games; and Kelsey Grammer, whose strangely written, hard-boiled police detective on crutches starts out narrating the story, then disappears from it altogether until the end.

There are murders, and whole lives hang on the turn of a card or a college game point spread. Logic is no more a strong suit in first time screenwriter Robert Tannen's script than originality is; it takes the writer's professor husband (Ray Liotta), for example, two-thirds of the movie to discover that she's drained their bank account.

But bizarre logic is also the gambling addict's lifeblood, and director Mark Rydell ("On Golden Pond") is often good at evoking the desperation and superstitious hope that's a big part of the gaming spirit. This is nothing new, either, but it's enough to keep the movie intriguing enough to watch, if not a Big Spin nail-biter.

Filmed in Southern California, "Even Money" seems to take place in a midsize Eastern city that goes unnamed. Seems about right for a movie about lives that are more or less headed nowhere.

Bob Strauss [phone]

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EVEN MONEY - Two and one half stars

(R: violence, language.)

Starring: Kim Basinger, Nick Cannon, Danny DeVito, Kelsey Grammer, Carla Gugino, Ray Liotta, Jay Mohr, Tim Roth, Grant Sullivan, Forest Whitaker.

Director: Mark Rydell.

Running time: 1 hr. 48 min.

Playing: ArcLight, Hollywood; AMC 15, Century City; Landmark NuWilshire, Santa Monica.

In a nutshell: Several people who have gambling problems cross stories in this middling ensemble drama.

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Kim Basinger's novelist and Danny DeVito's casino magician are looking for luck in all the wrong places, all of which have something to do with gambling, in "Lucky You."