House of Games

House of Games (1987) is a crime thriller you can watch online on iFILM — David Mamet's directorial debut, from his own script. Lindsay Crouse plays Margaret Ford, a psychiatrist with a successful practice and a bestselling book, who finds herself drawn into a world she's spent her career studying from a safe distance. One of her patients is deep in gambling debt. That's the crack in the door.

She tracks down the grifter who holds the debt — Mike, played by Joe Mantegna — and instead of a confrontation, gets an invitation. He'll show her how the con works from the inside. She finds it more interesting than she should. Each time she steps further in, the map of who is deceiving whom shifts again.

Mamet's dialogue does what it always does: it is clipped, rhythmically precise, and strips out everything decorative. Ricky Jay and William H. Macy appear early in their careers. The ending snaps shut with the feeling that it was the only possible ending, even though you didn't see it. Stream House of Games (1987) on iFILM.