The Gambler Returns: The Luck of the Draw / The Gambler V: Playing for Keeps
October 2003 Reviewed by: Josh Barber Format: DVD	(all ratings out of 5): Overall Enjoyment Picture Quality Packaged Extras Sound Quality

Hollywood has a long history of celebrity vanity projects, whether it is actors who think they can sing (Eddie Murphy, Keanu Reeves, Jennifer Lopez) or singers who think they can act (Jennifer Lopez). Of course, not just the pop and rock arenas have contributed to these crossovers; country music has contributed its fair share, too.

In 1978, Kenny Rogers covered a song originally written and performed by Don Schlitz, "The Gambler." It was just the sort of "story song" that Rogers seemed born to perform. His version became his biggest hit, garnering him a Song of the Year Grammy and more than 35 million records sold. The song also spawned several made-for-TV movies, all starring Rogers. The two most recent are now available as a two-disc DVD set from Hallmark Home Entertainment.

The Gambler Returns: The Luck of the Draw, which was made in 1991, finds Brady Hawkes (Rogers), the man who knows when to hold 'em and knows when to fold 'em, on his way to San Francisco for what is billed as the last legal poker game in America. The stakes are high and the best cardsharps in the world are coming together for one final head-to-head match. As Hawkes heads west, he has to contend with a whole mess o' trouble while keeping an eye on the $100,000 entry fee.

If the plot sounds familiar, it is because the same idea was used a few years later for Maverick, which starred Mel Gibson. If that movie is better, it is because the producers had a chance to see The Gambler Returns and knew what problems to avoid.

The Gambler Returns, the fourth film in the series, is definitely filled with adventure. Our hero and his two traveling companions -- Rick Rossovich as Ethan Cassidy and Reba McEntire as Burgundy Jones -- move from one caper to the next, making their way through the history of America's West. Unfortunately, this quick pace often leaves the film disjointed and harried.

The main cast does a fine job in their roles, especially McEntire who displays talent that earned her a network sitcom. Many old Western stars have cameos, from Lucas McCain (The Rifleman) to Kwai Chang Caine (Kung Fu). In fact, there are so many cameos that they begin to border on self-parody. The only place this running joke runs is into the ground.

The video picture is consistently orange throughout, most likely a conscious choice to give the film an aged, faded quality. If you can stand it through the first scenes, you will be able to stand it throughout. The perpetual sepia tone soon becomes commonplace, and stops distracting.

This is a two-disc set, and The Gambler Returns is split oddly between the two. I'm not exactly sure why this is, since the second disc also houses the complete second film in the set, The Gambler V: Playing for Keeps.

Now living the life of a rancher, Brady Hawkes learns that his son has started running with a gang called the Wild Bunch. It's the Gambler versus Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, with the Pinkerton Detective Agency hot on their trail.

As a Gambler movie that has nothing to do with gambling, The Gambler V has its good points. The cast is entirely capable, and doesn't labor under the same sort of "wink-wink, nudge-nudge" humor as the previous film. The color palette is more balanced and there are some genuinely clever moments in the script. My only major problem with the film is that it could easily have been any Old West cowpoke in the role. There’s nothing specific to tie it to the character Kenny Rogers developed in four previous efforts.

There are no special features on either of the discs, unless anyone still finds Scene Selections "special." I really find it hard to believe that everyone involved in these films is too busy these days to provide a commentary or brief interview.

For two films that feature gambling, gunfights, bank robbery, and bordellos, The Gambler Returns and The Gambler V are both perfectly good family offerings, as we've come to expect from Hallmark TV movies. They may not be superbly good or even particularly memorable, but they are certainly inoffensively fun.

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