The most narratively loose of Robert Altman's '70s films, California Split details the haphazard lives of two compulsive gamblers searching for that ever-elusive big score. Newly single and soon-to-be-unemployed Bill (George Segal) joins live-wire pal Charlie (Elliott Gould), as the pair moves from Fruit Loops with Charlie's hooker roommates Sue (Gwen Welles) and Barbara (Ann Prentiss) to bets on horses, backroom card games, boxing, and basketball. They make it to Reno, but Bill comes to realize
that even the big score may not be the answer to the meaning (or meaninglessness) of life. For Charlie, however, that's all there is. ~ Lucia Bozzola, Rovi
The film is technically and physically handsome, all the more so for being mostly location work, but lacks a cohesive and reinforced sense of story direction.
What Altman comes up with is sometimes almost a documentary feel; at the end of California Split we know something about organized gambling in this country we didn't know before.
A film such as this, which is essentially a series of comic vignettes without a plot, depends upon its performances, and both Gould and Segal are in top form.
Adding emphasis on the homo-ness of their lucrative bond are the repeated instances where the interference of women breaks both their concentration and their hot streaks.
he two actors' inventive, improvized banter is a treat, and they are ably supported by Prentiss and Welles, both given room and encouragement to make their mark by the director.
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