Owning Mahowny

In the acting department, there's nobody on the current scene with more sheer talent --- or offbeat charisma -- than Philip Seymour Hoffman, in whose bearish body nestles the heart of a lithe and limber artist.

Kwietniowski follows up his impressive debut feature, "Love and Death on Long Island," with this equally absorbing study of a compulsive personality.

Kwietniowski turns up the tension so incrementally, we don't realize the scope of Mahowny's moral wreck until it is too late.

Owning Mahowny may at times feel futile in its colorless, disheartening subject matter, but that's the point -- to see how barren Mahowny's life becomes. Hoffman gives the film relevance.

Hurt, who starred in Kwietniowski's earlier study in compulsion, "Life and Death on Long Island," is oily perfection as the devious Victor.

Just doesn't give us enough to hold onto, perhaps partly because it's executed with so much restraint and subtlety. It's often a tense, uncomfortable little movie.

Ironically, it's most engaging when the focus shifts to Hurt's matter-of-factly amoral enabler, whose glistening suits and jewel-colored shirt-and-tie combinations suggest a particularly poisonous tropical reptile.

What transcends and carries this true story of the largest bank fraud case in Canadian history is the phenomenal central performance of Phillip Seymour Hoffman. Dan Mahowny (Hoffman) is a bank manager with a serious gambling problem. With his position, he has access to a multi-million dollar account witch ultimately leads to him gambling $10 million dollars in a span of 18 months. The main focus of the screenplay is Mahowny's obsession and compulsion and it's devastating effects professionally and personally. It's Hoffman's ability to reveal to us that beneath his all consuming addiction lies a descent, desperate soul.

This film is a success for one major reason and that is Philip Seymour Hoffman. It is no shocker he turned in a great performance here, considering he always did so in his career, but he truly carried this film. The plot is interesting, yes, and the other actors here, such as Minnie Driver and John Hurt, are also strong, but boy oh boy does Hoffman ever stand tall. Luckily, the storyline is also very captivating and hooks you right in as you realize what Mahowny has been doing and how deep he is in the hole that makes him do what he does. The struggles facing this man are perfectly portrayed by Hoffman and the struggles facing his girlfriend are brilliantly and beautifully portrayed by Driver, who is a close second to Hoffman here in terms of performance. Overall, Owning Mahowny paints a sympathetic and understanding picture of a man of a man who embezzled more than $10 million and is a success thanks to the acting and solid story.

Hoffman is no doubt one of the finest actors of our generation and Owning Mahowny is no different. This is about as close to the manic/depressive sweat to problem gambling as a movie can get. I just don't often return to stories that bleed out slow and sure until the inevitable corpse is shown just before the credits roll.