On this day in movie history - The Big Town (1987 movie & novel):

The Big Town

directed by Ben Bolt and Harold Becker,

written by Robert Roy Pool,

based on the novel The Arm by Clark Howard,

was released in the United States on September 25, 1987.
Music by Michael Melvoin and Frank Fitzpatrick.

Cast:

Matt Dillon, Diane Lane, Tommy Lee Jones, Bruce Dern, Lee Grant, Tom Skerritt, Suzy Amis, David Marshall Grant, Don Francks, Del Close, Meg Hogarth, Cherry Jones, Alvaro D'Antonio, David James Elliott, Steve Yorke, Chris Owens, Sean McCann, Kevin Fox, Marc Strange, Don Lake, Angelo Rizacos, Chris Benson, Gary Farmer, Diego Matamoros, Sarah Polley, Kirsten Bishop, Kenneth McGregor, Viki Matthews, Cherie McGroarty, Sandy Czapiewski, Marie Siebert, Julie Conte, A.C. Peterson, Sam Malkin, Robert Morelli, Layne Coleman, Lolita Davidovich, William Colgate, William Forrest MacDonald, Len Doncheff, Michael Caruana, Richard Comar, Lubomir Mykytiuk, Robert Ramsay Collins, Errol Slue, Gerry Pearson, Hugo Dann, John Evans, J. Winston Carroll, Diane Gordon, David Berni, Robert Mavor, Robert Minkoff.

Recommended reading:

The Arm

By Clark Howard.

Filmed as The Big Town (1987), directed by Ben Bolt and Harold Becker.

First published 1967.

Published by Fawcett / Gold Medal.

ASIN: B0012513FS

Paperback.

Description:

A high-tension novel of the seething underworld of the professional crapshooter – where the women come easy and the points come hard.

Before young J.C. Cullen hit Chicago, nobody had ever heard of him. But Cully knew he had it- the cool, the guts, the skill, the magic... whatever it took to be a winner. The big-time players in Chicago had never seen anything like him. Within a week he was known in every gambling haunt in the city... every bar, brothel, striptease joint, and backroom. He was Cully the Arm, King of the crapshooters. He was hated, envied, respected... and lonely. Then he met Lorry. Beautiful, tempting, and evil as Hell. As skilled in sex as he was with dice. And far deadlier. The game she played had no rules – and no limit. Cully knew this, but he couldn't stop. Even though the stake was his own life.