Winner Take All (1975) (TV)

Director:

Paul Bogart

Writers:

Bill Garner (written by)
Caryl Ledner (writer)

Release Date:

3 March 1975 (USA)

Genre:

Drama

Plot:

In this TV-movie, Shirley Jones plays an average American housewife who just happens to be addicted to gambling...

Plot Keywords:

Gambling | Compulsive Gambler

Cast

Shirley Jones	...	Eleanor Anderson
Laurence Luckinbill	...	Bill Anderson
Sam Groom	...	Rick Santos
Joyce Van Patten	...	Edie Gould
Joan Blondell	...	Beverly Craig
Sylvia Sidney	...	Anne Barclay
John Carter	...	Leonard Fields
Lorie Busk	...	Stacy Anderson
Wynn Irwin	...	Arnie
Al Lettieri	...	Man at Track
Carmen Zapata	...	Sara
Jason Wingreen	...	Jerry
Parley Baer	...	Bob
Joseph Hacker
Alex Nicol

Also Known As:

Time Lock

Runtime:

97 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Filming Locations:

Los Angeles, California, USA

Company:

The Jozak Company

Goofs:

Factual errors: When Ellie wins $30,000 at the track, the cashier hands her the money in cash and Ellie walks away. In reality, anyone who won this much on a single race would be required to fill out various tax statements before the winnings were paid out.

Shirley Jones' performance lends film distinction.

Perhaps even more than her in her Oscar winning performance for "Elmer Gantry," Shirley Jones here achieves distinction with her convincing delineation of a woman teetering on the brink of destroying her life through a gambling addiction.

What lends great conviction to the production is the absolutely normal personality Miss Jones projects as the protagonist. Gambling addicts are not wild eyed and sinister looking psychopaths, and it is therefore entirely appropriate that Miss Jones' character is an attractive, charming, and thoroughly upstanding seeming character. And therein lies the rub...all of which allows her to so convincingly "take in" so many others, not the least of which is her husband, (Laurence Luckinbill) from whom she has appropriated (and lost) $30,000. Most of all, she has deceived herself.

Even the cut rate conventions of TV movie production work to this movie's benefit. By shooting the movie mainly within the confines of actual suburban split level homes, hotel rooms, pawn shops, and gambling casinos, the production achieves an almost documentary veracity.

Also working much in its favor is a superb performance from Sam Groom as a sleazy back room spiv, as well as welcome cameos from screen greats Sylvia Sidney and Joan Blondell.