REVIEW: Follow the Money (and the Intrigue) in Gibney's Casino Jack

Both would play a part in Abramoff's unholy ascension, and Reed, in particular, would get caught in his downward spiral. But they're only two of the bit players Gibney has to pack into Abramoff's increasingly nutso story: After some dilly-dallying in Hollywood (he produced both the 1989 Red Scorpion and its 1994 sequel), Abramoff joined the lobbying firm Preston Gates & Ellis in 1994. His activities there included arranging luxury junkets for lawmakers to the Marianas Islands, to ensure they'd vote against U.S. labor laws that would restrict the garment industry -- built on sweat-shop labor -- that was thriving there. Tom DeLay was one of Abramoff's many friends in high places, and later, in 2003 (by which time Abramoff had joined another firm, Greenberg Traurig), he became House Majority Leader. Abramoff would also donate $100,000 to the Bush campaign that year: Maintaining expensive friends is, well, expensive.

Gibney packs a lot of information into Casino Jack, and while he lays out events and complicated involvements with surprising clarity, there's still a lot here to untangle and process. As I watched the movie I kept wishing I could draw a flowchart, with lots of arrows and circled names, just to help keep it all straight. But Gibney does present the unraveling of Abramoff's seediest money dealings, which involved siphoning dollars away from Indian casinos and directly into Congressional pockets, in a way that's pretty easy to understand. Abramoff was a slick charmer who, as one figure quoted in the movie puts it, "could sweet-talk a dog off a meat truck." He was also arrogant as all get-out, ultimately believing he could do whatever he wanted and get away with it. He cooked up a hugely profitable kickback scheme with an associate, Michael Scanlon; they'd aggressively overbill their Native American clients while making fun of them behind their backs. In e-mails he exchanged with Scanlon, the keystroke-happy Abramoff refers to the Native Americans he bilked by a number of colorful terms, including "troglodytes" and "monkeys."

And yet when Abramoff's fall eventually comes -- and he drags several others, including DeLay and Ohio Republican representative Bob Ney, down with him -- it's hardly sweet. Gibney doesn't take gleeful pleasure in Abramoff's story, and that's not because the filmmaker thinks he's dealing with a good guy. Gibney is the kind of filmmaker who allows himself to feel some affection, or even just a wry appreciation, for his subjects, recognizing that that doesn't amount to approval of their behavior. And so when Gibney reaches the end, thus far, of Abramoff's story -- he's currently serving a prison term of five years and some change -- there's no sense of relief, no gloating, no staunch reinforcement of the idea that justice will always be served. Instead, Gibney's point seems to be that there will always be audacious people in powerful positions who believe they can get away with anything. When one does get caught, it's best not to spend too much time laughing at his antics. Our energy is better spent looking out for the next one.

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