THE MOVIE:

Jon Voight stars in Lookin' to Get Out as Alex Kovac, a gambler chasing after a loss. Ten grand in the hole, he's only got a couple of hours before the corpulent gangsters he owes take it out of his hide, and so he grabs his best pal Jerry (Burt Young, best known for the Rocky movies) and high tails it to Vegas. Alex has a plan to win it big, using some names he picked up a few years back when he lived in Sin City to get him and Jerry a free room and an account to bankroll them.

What Alex hasn't figured on is that the lady he left behind when his luck ran out before is going to be waiting for him out there. Patti (Ann-Margret) was a hooker when she was dating Alex, but she has since gone legit, working at the hotel in some capacity while also dating the owner, Bernie Gold (Richard Bradford, who looks like he could be Kevin Spacey's father). Bernie is also the name that Alex drops to get his hook-up, and when Patti hears it coming out of his mouth, she knows something fishy is going on.

Lookin' to Get Out was made in 1980, but held for release until 1982, when a studio-mangled version finally hit theatres before quickly fading. It was directed by the great Hal Ashby (Being There, Harold & Maude), whose best days were unfortunately behind him, and co-written by Voight and first-time screenwriter Al Schwartz. All involved do good work here, Ashby could still pull a film together, but it's hard not to think that there is something missing from the center of this picture. This DVD represents an extended cut put together in private by Ashby, who was an Oscar-winning editor, and according to notes by Jon Voight that are included as an insert here, the director has added scenes back in and fleshed out the story, tweaking the entire film from the ground up. This cut is fifteen minutes longer than the theatrical version, but like the characters Ashby's film portrays, he still didn't get at the success that was eluding him.

Which isn't to say that Lookin' to Get Out is bad, because it's not. Excepting the overlong chase through the back halls of the casino, the movie actually flows too fast for it to ever settle in the mind long enough to worry about what might be wrong. The narrative follows Alex's manic pace, often seeming to lack as much direction as he does. By chance, he encounters Smitty (Bert Remsen), a great blackjack player now working as a waiter in the casino. Alex saw him win big before, and using the money he got out of his con, he sets Smitty up to do it again. The blackjack game pays off on the gambling high the film has been trying to effect, with Ashby creating tension around the table without ever getting too caught up in the cards. It's what happens after, though, that ends up proving the whole film is a little bit hollow.

Jon Voight is on target in his performance as Alex. He is electrically charged from start to finish, never letting up or pausing for reflection. This ends up being the Achilles heel, however; Voight wrote himself a showy role, but he forgot to include any heart. Once the movie starts to wind down, I found myself thinking that though I've watched Alex all this time, I didn't really want to. While I didn't need him to be redeemable, I did need some better reason to like him, to cheer him on or feel sorry for him. He's not a decent guy, he doesn't treat people well, and he's not good at anything. He isn't even funny, his bad jokes actually being a story point. In the end, he learns nothing, and the comedown that should transform him has little impact.

This means the only thing propping Alex up--and by default, the movie, as well--are the people who, for whatever reason, have chosen to be his friends and in doing so, have committed to stick by him through thick and thin. Alex and Jerry's camaraderie is winningly childish. They regularly descend into fits of laughter at the most inappropriate moments. Alternately, Ann-Margret's performance as Patti is the one restrained element of the movie. She is understated, calm, and emotionally conflicted. She and Jerry share a couple of very human moments, bonding over their being anchored to a screw-up like Alex, even noting their awareness that he's a screw-up. Both admit that there are better options out there, but in the end, maybe this is what Lookin' to Get Out is about. More than the gambling, more than the insane highs, it's about the friendships in this life, the connections we make that carry us through even when we don't deserve it.

Lookin' to Get Out was shot by revered cinematographer Haskell Wexler, a frequent Ashby collaborator who also lensed pictures like One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and In the Heat of the Night (the movie Ashby won his editing Oscar for). Wexler goes for a grainy, natural look here that captures all the grit and grime of Las Vegas. It also matches well with the freeboating style, the whole thing feels like it's off the cuff. Again, this is what keeps Lookin' to Get Out moving and why it manages to be an enjoyable movie even if it's somewhat lacking. The film also ends up being a good record of Vegas at the time, capturing the activity at the casino and a real floorshow. This was the first production allowed into the MGM Grand. You'll even spot a young Siegfriend and Roy.

Speaking of spotting youngsters, trivia buffs will appreciate that this is the film debut of Jon Voight's famous daughter, Angelina Jolie, who plays the daughter of Ann-Margret's character. She would have been about five at the time of filming. Angelina's real-life mom, Marcheline Bertrand, also appears in Lookin' to Get Out as the woman in the jeep that Alex hits on at the beginning of the movie.

THE DVD

Video:
This new anamorphic transfer was struck from a 35 mm print that Hal Ashby had donated to the UCLA film archives. As a title card before the start of the movie warns us, this means some of the scenes are not as clean as the others, as that print was the only existing source for the material. Some scenes do have more scratches and spots than others, but the bulk of the movie is consistently decent, with good colors and a look that is reflective of the film stock at the time.

Sound:
The mono mix of the English soundtrack is good. It has solid volume levels, though I could have done without the music being so loud. The funky score by Johnny Mandel (The Verdict) is pretty dated, and the title song that plays over the closing credits is so atrocious, it has to be heard to be believed.

There is optional Closed Captioning for the deaf and hearing impaired, as well as French subtitles.

Extras:
The movie comes in a standard-sized plastic case with a paper insert featuring Jon Voight's explanation about this cut. I am not sure Warner Bros. is doing itself any favors with that DVD cover, though. The graphic design is pretty low rent. Looks like promo for a summer stock production or something.

There are two bonuses on the disc, the original theatrical trailer and a new sixteen-minute interview collage with co-writers Voight and Al Schwartz, and actors Burt Young and Ann-Margret--who still looks remarkable and gets the best moment in the featurette when she corrects Jon Voight for calling her "Ann" and not her full name. The lady has class, and a fella should be so lucky to be schooled by her for anything! This bonus is a short but inclusive history of the production. It's interesting to see how history breeds genuine nostalgia and appreciation in a cast, and how these interviews are so much more genuine than the on-set backslapping that makes similar featurettes for recent films so shallow.

FINAL THOUGHTS:
Recommended. Though the Lookin' to Get Out: Extended Version is not the big win for a long lost film that one might hope, it's still a karmic victory in that Hal Ashby's vision for this flawed movie is restored. For fans of manic, screwy comedies about gambler's running after the money (think California Split by way of Howard Hawks), then Lookin' to Get Out mostly delivers. The cast is strong--Burt Young is all kinds of likable, Ann-Margret is sexy and soothing, and Jon Voight goes for broke as the finger-snapping, fast-talking lead. Unfortunately, as the co-writer for the picture, he maybe focused too much on the showboating and not enough on the soul.

Jamie S. Rich is a novelist and comic book writer. He is best known for his collaborations with Joelle Jones, including the hardboiled crime comic book You Have Killed Me, the challenging romance 12 Reasons Why I Love Her, and the 2007 prose novel Have You Seen the Horizon Lately?, for which Jones did the cover. All three were published by Oni Press. His most recent projects include the futuristic romance A Boy and a Girl with Natalie Nourigat; Archer Coe and the Thousand Natural Shocks, a loopy crime tale drawn by Dan Christensen; and the horror miniseries Madame Frankenstein, a collaboration with Megan Levens. Follow Rich's blog at Confessions123.com.