New Poker Movie ‘Molly’s Game’ Set to Open on Christmas Day
"Molly's Game," a new movie based on the autobiography of Molly Bloom, an entrepreneur who ran high-stakes poker games for Hollywood actors and other celebrities and was busted by the FBI, is to open in movie theaters on Christmas Day, December 25, 2017, the movie's producers announced.
The film had originally been scheduled to open next month.
"Molly's Game" stars Jessica Chastain as Molly and Kevin Costner as her father.
Others appearing in the movie include Idris Elba, Michael Cera, Jeremy Strong, Chris O'Dowd and Bill Camp.
The movie features the directorial debut of Aaron Sorkin, previously best known as a writer for television and films.
A press release about the movie says it is "based on the true story of Molly Bloom, an Olympic-class skier who ran the world's most exclusive high-stakes poker game for a decade before being arrested in the middle of the night by 17 FBI agents wielding automatic weapons. Her players included Hollywood royalty, sports stars, business titans and finally, unbeknownst to her, the Russian mob. Her only ally was her criminal defense lawyer, Charlie Jaffey, who learned that there was much more to Molly than the tabloids led us to believe."
RottenTomatoes.com, a website that critiques new movies, gave "Molly's Game" a rating of 7.2, on a scale of 1 to 10, while the Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com) rated it at 7.3.
BuzzFeed.com called the movie "witty" and "very entertaining" while The New York Times (www.nytimes.com) said it was "a good bet."
Maclean's (www.macleans.ca), a Canadian magazine, predicted a Best Actress Academy Award nomination for Chastain for the Bloom role.
Bloom was 35 when she was arrested by the FBI in 2013 for running high-stakes poker games.
Among the celebrities who participated in the games were actors Ben Affleck, Leonardo DiCaprio and Tobey Maguire.
After her bust, Bloom cashed in on her saga by penning a memoir titled "Molly's Game: From Hollywood's Elite to Wall Street's Billionaire Boys Club, My High-Stakes Adventure in the World of Underground Poker."
