| Director | Guy Ritchie |
|---|---|
| Genre | crime film, drama film |
| Runtime | 115 min |
| Country | France, United Kingdom |
| Budget | $27 million |
| Box office | $6.7 million |
In an unidentified city, cockney gangster and gambler Jake Green is released from prison for an unspecified crime.
Two years later, Jake and his brother Billy travel to a casino owned by crime boss Dorothy Macha (Ray Liotta), who had ordered Jake to commit the crime that led to his imprisonment. Though Billy is reluctant, the brothers have arrived to collect the debt that Jake believes the gangster owes them. Macha promptly calls them up to a private area of his casino, where a high-rollers' game is taking place.
Jake bets a fortune on a chip toss with one of the table's players, and loses. Manipulating Macha into a sense of false security, he makes the same bet with him, but this time, he wins. Humiliated, Macha orders his right-hand man Paul to have Jake murdered.
As the brothers leave the casino, a loan shark named Zach tells Jake that he can help him. In the stairwell, Jake collapses and is rushed to the hospital. The doctors do not know why he fainted but inform him they will have the results in a few days. Later Jake arrives home without Billy, where Macha's assassin, Sorter, is waiting for him.
On his doorstep is a card, which reads "Pick This Up". As Jake bends to retrieve the card, bullets fly over his back. As the shooting continues Zach arrives and rescues Jake. Zach introduces Jake to his partner, Avi and they offer him a deal: they will take all of his money, and he will do what they say, no questions asked. In exchange, they will protect Jake from Macha. In the course of their proposal, they show Jake his medical file, which they have mysteriously obtained and tell him that he has a rare blood disease that will cause his death within three days. Jake suspects he is being conned and leaves.
Later, at a visit to his doctor, he is given the same prognosis and said to have three days to live. Jake returns to Avi and Zach's poolhall with a satchel of money and agrees to their terms. The mysterious men reveal that his money will be used to fund their money-lending enterprise, then question Jake about his time in prison. Jake explains that he was given a choice either to spend 14 years in the general prison population or 7 years in solitary confinement - he chose the latter.
During his stint in solitary confinement, Jake learned of a specific strategy (referred to as "the Formula") that is supposed to let its user win every game. The Formula itself was discovered by two unnamed men who inhabited the cells either side of him, a chess expert and a con man. During the first five years of his seven-year sentence, the three men communicate their thoughts on confidence tricks and chess moves via messages hidden inside library books.
The chess expert and the con man plan to leave their cells simultaneously, and promise to take Jake with them, but when they disappear from their cells, they leave Jake behind to serve the remaining two years of his sentence. When Jake is released, he uses the Formula, to go about winning at various casinos.
Meanwhile, Macha brokers a cocaine deal with Lily Walker, the advisor of unseen crime kingpin Sam Gold. Walker warns Macha that Sam Gold is not someone who tolerates failure. Jake accompanies Avi and Zach as they perform a heist of the cocaine. Desperate that he is now indebted to Gold, Macha sends Paul to appeal to his rival, Triad kingpin Lord John, to sell him replacement cocaine at a heavily inflated price. Lord John insultingly declines making a deal with his enemy. With Jake, Zach and Avi then rob John for millions of dollars, framing Macha for the theft.
Furious, Lord John sends a hitwoman dressed as a waitress to kill Macha at his restaurant. Macha struggles with the hitwoman, during which she shoots his finger off before Macha kills her and Sorter kills her getaway driver as he attempts to flee. In retaliation, Macha has Sorter kill Lord John, then sends Paul and his henchmen to find the location of the stolen cocaine. The Triads deny any involvement, and implicate Jake even when Paul tortures them to death.
Zach and Avi have Jake donate all the money he has given them so far to a child's charity in Macha's name. Macha takes the credit, believing it will improve his reputation. He is later visited by Walker, who claims that Gold is furious at Macha's newfound publicity and his constant delaying of the deal. Macha pleads for more time to settle business, but Walker simply leaves with a cryptic threat.
Three days after Jake found out about his terminal diagnoses, he awakes to a call from Avi, who tells him he is "free" of his disease. Jake returns to his physician, who reveals that the original diagnosis was incorrect; Jake suffers from a rare blood disease, but it is treatable and not terminal. Meanwhile, Macha, now believing Jake is the one conspiring against him, doubles down on the contract against him. His henchmen track him down to a house inhabited by Avi and Zach, but he evades them. In the chase, one of the hitmen accidentally shoots himself and the others believe that Jake killed him.
Jake meets Avi and Zach on a rooftop, where they are revealed as Jake's "neighbors" during his incarceration. Avi attempts to get Jake to understand the nature of the ego and to challenge his own lifelong investment in it. The men explain to Jake that by stripping him of the physical embodiment of ego (his money) they have freed him from Gold's "game"; Sam Gold's power is granted only by those who invest in him.
Elsewhere, Billy is betrayed by his bodyguard, who lets Sorter and Paul into his home. Paul tortures Billy and threatens to kidnap his daughter to find Jake. Paul's violent acts unsettle Sorter and allow him to find his conscience. Sorter rejects his ego by killing Paul and all his companions to rescue the girl.
That night, an armed Jake breaks into the penthouse where Macha is sleeping. Surprisingly, he kneels before the bed and asks a half-naked Macha for forgiveness. Jake leaves in the elevator, which gets stuck at the 13th floor.