The Killing of a Chinese Bookie is a 1976 American neo-noir crime film written and directed by John Cassavetes and starring Ben Gazzara.
Though Cosmo spends a great deal of time and effort designing and choreographing the venue's artistic burlesque act, he fears his customers are there only to see the naked bodies of his strippers.
Cosmo makes the final payment on a seven-year gambling debt to a loan shark named Marty, and in return invites him and his mob associates to the club's night act.
Eager to celebrate his newfound freedom, Cosmo goes on a night on the town with his three favorite dancers (Margo, Rachel, and Sherry), and subsequently racks up a $23,000 poker debt, returning him to the position he'd just left.
The following night, gangster Mort and his associates arrive at the club and order Cosmo to find and kill a bookie named Harold Ling in exchange for wiping out his outstanding debt.
After they explain that the bookie’s house is guarded and booby-trapped, the men give Cosmo a receipt for the money he owes them and encourage him to tear it up, proving that the hit will cancel his debt.
For a restaurant scene late in the film, Cassavetes invited a number of prominent Hollywood studio executives to play extras, but then deliberately removed all their faces from the final cut.
A film maker of vaunting, demanding individuality, Cassavetes is like a jazz soloist, an improviser who tears off on wild riffs from a basic, familiar melody.
"[10] Vincent Canby of The New York Times thought differently, saying, "The Killing of a Chinese Bookie is like the last three of the director's films (A Woman Under the Influence, Husbands and Minnie and Moskowitz) in the way it resolutely refuses to come to a point strong or interesting enough to support the loving care that's gone into its production, particularly on the part of the actors.
[12] During the late 1990s director Brett Ratner acquired the rights to film a remake of The Killing of a Chinese Bookie and recruited John Cassavetes's son Nick to write the screenplay.