The Killing of a Chinese Bookie

For the 1974 film of the same name see Dynamite Brothers The Killing of a Chinese Bookie is a 1976 gangster film directed and written by John Cassavetes and starring Ben Gazzara. A rough and gritty film, it is comparable in form to Martin Scorsese's Mean Streets (1973) and indeed Scorsese helped Cassavetes in its inception. The formidable character Gazzara plays was based on an impersonation he did for his friend Cassavetes in the 1970s. The acto... more

For the 1974 film of the same name see Dynamite Brothers The Killing of a Chinese Bookie is a 1976 gangster film directed and written by John Cassavetes and starring Ben Gazzara. A rough and gritty film, it is comparable in form to Martin Scorsese's Mean Streets (1973) and indeed Scorsese helped Cassavetes in its inception. The formidable character Gazzara plays was based on an impersonation he did for his friend Cassavetes in the 1970s. The actor and director collaborated for the first time on Cassavetes' film Husbands (1970) where Gazzara appeared alongside Peter Falk and Cassavetes himself. The collaboration of the two men culminated in The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, with Gazzara taking the lead role of the hapless strip joint owner Cosmo Vitelli. The film's original release, at 135 minutes in length, was a commercial disappointment and the movie was pulled from distribution after only seven days. At a May 17, 2008 George Eastman House screening in Rochester, Ben Gazzara said he ... less