SHADOWS Contactless: 9 PM Friday July 17 SBS on Demand and Messenger: THE GAMBLER

Axel Freed has more than most in his social percentile. Literate and middle class, he's a popular teacher of literature, still young and sexy but is constantly haunted by the thrill of risking everything. He loses in freefall, rises with a break and deep dives into debt, inviting the mob into his daily life. But this is not just the usual riches to rags morality tale. Axel is constantly on the lookout for a hustle, no matter how small the thrill, same as any addict, but his other hook is in his social currency. Despite all the bluster and dealing and bourgeois machismo he still wants the love that keeps on giving. But look what happens when the stakes are the highest and take the most he's ever given to build and play? Will he still own himself and where can he go if he does win?

An early casting choice for the lead in this film was Warren Beatty and you'll see why. Beatty's instant charm mixed with the sleaze he was able to inject made him perfect for Axel. Instead, James Caan, still fresh from The Godfather, brings a tougher New York sass to the role. Grittier than Steve McQueen but rougher than Beatty (who'd go to his own masterclass the following year in Shampoo), Caan allowed the film as a whole to breathe around him rather than own too much of its centre. Lauren Hutton as his girlfriend Billie offers her own toughness and pushback, allowing a fluidity to their standoff.

The Gambler is a '70s film the same way that Taxi Driver or The French Connection are '70s films: it flies low enough to the street level to look verite but keeps its cine-art ... arty. Czech born Karel Reisz had already made a visible presence as a filmmaker in the UK but here adapts himself easily to US conditions, going straight to the new Hollywood table with the confidence to know that his sense of classic Hollywood could take care of itself.