Owning Mahowny is based on a true story and this makes the film all the more bewildering and tragic. Dan Mahowny (Philip Seymore Hoffman) is a bank employee with a gambling addiction. As the film opens, Mahowny owes over $10,000 to a bookie. He doesn't have the money to pay and in a scene that is so brilliantly acted by Hoffman that it immediately hooks the audience irrevocably into this character, Mahowny makes the life-altering choice to swindle the funds from his employer.

The film takes place in a time before computer records. Lending applications were filled out on paper and all it took for approvial for millions of dollars in loans was a simple verbal confirmation from one bank employee to another. Mohowny simply fills out the required paperwork, requests an extended line of credit for one of the bank's clients and then draws out the money, presumably on the client's behalf.

At first, Mahowny plans on paying off his bookie and nothing more, but the allure of such easy money quickly becomes too much. Here, at last, is a seemingly unending source of funds to supply his need for betting.

Mahowny never admits to a gambling problem. Instead, he believes himself to have a financial problem. Although never explicitely vocalized, Hoffman's acting conveys the distinct impression that Mahowny fully believes that he will be able to catch one good break and pay back all of the money he's stolen, thus making everything all right.

The trouble is, when Mahowny does catch his breaks, he never stops. Gambling has such a vicsious hold on his soul that he can never walk away from the table unless there simply is not one more cent left in his pocket with which to bet. We watch with cold, almost clinical detachment, sometimes even through the casino's security cameras, as Mahowny pushes his last stack of chips into play time and time again. And when he loses, when he's wiped clean, he simply stands up and walks away, a little dazed and possibly unsure of what just happened.

Mahowny is absolutely not in it for the glory or the riches. When he walks into a casino with millions of dollars, the casino owner, Victor Foss (John Hurt) falls all over himself to cater to his newest high roller. Mahowny just blows him off. He's not there to eat expensive food or relax in the most luxurious suites, even if it is free. The only important thing is getting to the table and placing the bet.

A lesser performance might have gone for something more dramatic in these moments single-minded focus and unbearable loss. It would be easy, I imagine, to simply display a man breaking down from once again losing everything. Hoffman's performance is much more subtle and infinitely more brilliant than that. Watched from afar, one might never even notice that the quiet man at the blackjack table has just pissed away nine million dollars and yet the conflict and emotion is there in Mahowny's eyes. He knows that he should have stopped while he was ahead, but he also knows that there is no way that he could have stopped. If you were to drag him kicking and screaming from the table, he would only wander into another casino and put the whole wad on the biggest longshot in some sort of grim determination to always come out the loser.

Throughout all of this, the film never preaches about the evils of gambling. It never has to. The pitfalls are plainly visible in the quiet desperation in Dan Mahowny's eyes and in the manner in which is girlfriend, Belinda (Minnie Driver), is painfully pushed away.

Naturally, Mahowny can't continue stealing from the bank forever. At first we may feel some slim amount of hope that he will catch the right break and get himself out, but it quickly become apparent that this will never happen. The only question remaining is just how deep Mahowny will go before getting caught. One thing is certain: he won't ever walk away from the table willingly.