Bernie Lootz (William H. Macy) is an employee of Shelly Kaplow (Alec Baldwin), the boss at the Shangri-La, a Las Vegas gambling casino and hotel that has seen better days. Bernie is the cooler, a person with such bad vibes that he puts a crimp in the winning streaks of the customers. All he has to do is pass by or touch the table and the dice rollers lose, the cards are jinxed, and the slots are silenced. Bernie walks with a limp from the time years ago when Shelly smashed his kneecap after he ran up a huge gambling debt. Now, this hunched over and depressed fellow only has a week left before his marker is paid off and he can leave town.
Unbeknownst to Bernie, Shelly hires Natalie (Maria Bello), a cocktail waitress, to seduce him so that he won't want to quit. Only problem is, Bernie falls madly in love with her. And, after years of being poorly treated by men and hustled repeatedly, she finds Bernie's honest emotions refreshing and endearing. Shelly is not happy with this development. Even more troubling, Bernie is now aglow with love and his bad karma on the casino floor has evaporated.
Wayne Kramer directs this romantic drama and draws out top-notch performances from the three leads. Another treat is the portrait of Las Vegas revealed in the conflict between the old school philosophy and management style of Shelly and the more corporate approach of Larry Sokolov (Ron Livingston), who wants to ditch the casino's aging singer (Paul Sorvino), remodel the place to serve a broader clientele, and use subliminal messages to brainwash patrons into thinking they are losers. In the end, Shelly shows his true colors when Bernie's son (Shawn Hatosy) and his wife (Estella Warren) show up and are caught cheating at the Shangri-La. As Bernie and Natalie try to beat the odds when everything is stacked against them, we root for these two losers. The Cooler challenges us to believe in love and Lady Luck.
The DVD has two audio commentaries, one with director/co-writer Wayne Kramer, co-writer Frank Hannah, and cinematogeher Jim Whitaker, and the other with Kramer and composer Mark Isham. There is also an "Anatomy of a Scene" episode from the Sundance Channel with a focus on costumes and set design.
