Gambling, card games, horse betting and other sports have always been an important business for the mafia. They operated lavish or illegal gambling operations throughout the United States; they paid law enforcement to ignore gambling operations. Over the years the history of gambling and casinos has changed especially since 1931, when Nevada legalized gambling. For my final article I specifically choose Casino as the classic mafia film that depicts a cross-section of the world or organizes crime and gambling. Casino is based on the story of Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal and the mafia's takeover of Las Vegas. As the Felt Top article stated, "It was the Mafia's most successful venture before the entire organization was destroyed by a little idiot called Anthony "the Ant" Spilatro who ruled the Strip with an iron fist before meet his destiny in a cornfield in Indiana” (www.gamemasteronline.com). Casino depicts the greed, deceit, money, power and murder that took place between two mobster best friends, Ace. and Nicky, in a gambling empire. The opening of the film begins with "But at night, you couldn't see the dessert that surrounds Las Vegas." a lot of holes in the dessert and a lot of problems are buried in those holes. You just have to get it right” (Casino, 1995) This quote struck me from the beginning and by the end of the film I felt it summed up the entire film Casinos of Vegas are the winners and the players have no chance. The bosses give the orders and the front man does all the work, all the bosses care about is just making money. The best insurance policy these men can make is to keep government officials in the middle of paper, while rampaging mob bosses pick each other apart piece by piece. Sam played by the rules and kept a low profile while Ginger and Nicky allowed power and greed to take over. They lied, cheated and stole their way to the top, they didn't care who they threw under the bus, all that mattered was achieving extravagant lifestyles of wealth and power. Ultimately the bosses will do whatever it takes to keep the old school mobster tradition alive, ultimately these members value the lifestyle too much to allow all the power and money to get into their heads. Deception and corruption play a huge role in the film as no one can trust each other and the holes in the dessert are hanging over their heads. The film did a good job of showing the corruption within Las Vegas and exposing the crime and punishment that comes with it..