150 Word Review: ‘Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets’ (2020)
'Cheers,' but depressing
Is Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets fact or fiction? The answer is “yes.” This grungy, deeply human movie about the last night of a seedy Las Vegas dive bar before closing down looks and feels like an intimate documentary about Bukowskian barflies, except every grim vignette is shaped and satisfying. It’s like watching an improvisational Robert Altman-esque hangout flick starring an incredible cast of eccentric character actors, including many grizzled non-actors playing versions of themselves.
The fact that the directors, brothers Turner and Bill Ross, are quirky documentarians may explain why this movie effortlessly melds reality television vérité with O'Neil's The Iceman Cometh. If Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets has a main character, it is Michael, a long-haired boozehound who has made the doomed bar his home and its customers his family over the years. Michael seems too intelligent and loving to drink his life away, but that’s how it is sometimes.