For various reasons, I bought the DVD of the movie. No roulette scenes shown. Only gambling scenes were in the beginning of the movie, mostly about slot machines, and those scenes were brief, mainly about gambling operators forcing varied small businessmen to install the (crooked) machines in their establishments. ... ... .... I guess the roulette wheel was just fanciful artwork from the publicity dept.
for $9.50 I sell it to US addresses. Pretty good movie. Good cast. Email me if interested; PayPal OK.
"A barbershop, caught between competing slot-machine combines, is bombed by a passing car. Discovering that children were killed in the explosion, gangster Steve Kalkas executes the man responsible. Kalkas arrives at the Palm Parade nightclub to hear Dixie Moore sing and is greeted by maitre'd Eddie. J. G. Temple, a former associate of Kalkas, who is in debt, propositions Dixie's friend Jackie Nolan for a quick trip to Havana. Eddie interrupts Dixie to auction her kisses, but she chooses a drunk reporter, Jim Adams, over Kalkas. After Eddie has Jim knocked out, she takes him home and the next morning calls his editor, George Kramer, and gives him her own $500 to make up for what he spent at the auction. Kramer then sends Jim to London on assignment to help him forget his fiancée, Joyce Beaton, who is marrying another man. Meanwhile, Dixie and Jackie quarrel over her unexpected departure to Havana with Temple. Kalkas, who sincerely loves Dixie, offers to marry her, but she does not love him, so he buys her an expensive apartment. After Kalkas receives word that the governor is appointing a special prosecutor named Briggs to investigate the bombing, he has Temple killed and sends Temple's girl to Big Edna, an experienced moll, without realizing she is Jackie. Back from London, Jim visits Dixie, and when Jackie's body is found in the river, he goes with Dixie to the hospital to identify her. Kramer assigns Jim the slot-machine story and he investigates Big Edna's seedy dive and finds Jackie's clothes. There he hears Big Edna dialing "Circle-1010" on the telepone phone before escaping. Dixie asks Kalkas for his help, but Jim is wary of him, so they agree to meet the police commissioner at Kalkas' office. Despite Dixie's involvement with Kalkas, Jim wants to marry her. After Jim has left, Dixie remembers hearing the number "Circle-1010" and, dialing it, discovers it is Kalkas' private line. Kalkas prepares to execute Jim by pushing him down an elevator shaft, as he did with Temple; however, when he realizes the police are on their way, he calls the elevator up for a quick escape. A gunfight ensues, during which Dixie rushes to save Jim from the elevator. Unaware it has moved, Kalkas falls to his death. Relieved that Jim has survived, Dixie leaves with him.
"King of Gamblers
King of Gamblers poster.jpg
Directed by Robert Florey
John E. Burch (assistant)
Written by Doris Anderson
Cinematography Harry Fischbeck
Edited by Harvey Johnston
Distributed by Paramount Pictures
Release date
April 23, 1937
Running time
78 minutes
Country United States
Language English
King of Gamblers is a 1937 American low-budget gangster film directed by Robert Florey. Akim Tamiroff takes an unusual featured role as a slot-machine racketeer whose bombing of an uncooperative barber shop leads to a murder charge. (The film was also known as Czar of the Slot Machines.)
"By her own account, silent film star Louise Brooks played a bit part in the film for Florey, who "specialised in giving jobs to destitute and sufficiently grateful actresses", referring both to herself and to Evelyn Brent.[1] However, Brooks does not appear in the completed film."
Robert
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