In “Two for the Money,” Al Pacino is fantastic.

Rene Russo is terrific.

Matthew McConaughey is … Matthew McConaughey.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing, especially when McConaughey plays a former college football star who lets himself be transformed into a slick, high-powered sales tour de force in the hands of Pacino. The veteran Oscar winner gives an amazing performance as a power-hungry, self-destructive manipulator with a heart, who runs a “sports advisory” business selling the winning picks to high-stakes gamblers.

After a knee injury ends his college career, McConaughey goes to work at a dead-end 900-number job in Las Vegas, making the recordings for the Jessica Simpson fan hotline in between pro football tryouts. When he gets the chance to fill in for a co-worker who does the sports picks hotline, his predictions consistently hit the nail on the head. Soon he’s recruited by Pacino to join his operation in New York.

Here endeth the straightforward story line. As soon as Pacino appears on screen, the film changes from a chronicle of a young man’s story to a multifaceted, three-dimensional study of three fascinating characters: rising star McConaughey, magnetic, self-pitying Pacino and his stabilizing but codependent wife, played with quiet energy by Rene Russo.

Pacino plays a veteran of every “anonymous” 12-step group in existence – gambling, nicotine, alcohol, you name it – who uses his first-hand knowledge of human frailty to sucker gamblers into betting on his firm’s sports picks. Already a loving husband and parent, he and McConaughey develop a tenuous father-son relationship as he grooms the young oddsmaking phenom into the firm’s leading seller and hot new TV personality, controlling every move along the way.

McConaughey’s not a clueless hayseed; he agrees to assume the new identity Pacino thrusts on him. But just like a teenager testing the limits of his parents’ control, as he grows more and more successful, the temptation to push the limits of his relationship with Pacino proves too much to resist.

Keeping the two men from tearing each other to pieces while binding them inextricably together, Russo absolutely shines as Pacino’s wife Toni, an ex-drug addict herself. In place of heroin, her new obsession is steering her husband clear of his self-destructive behavior.

Director D.J. Caruso captures spirited performances from all three leads, but the film is catapulted into extremes of emotion with the highs and lows of the pro and college football games whose outcomes mean winning or losing fortunes.

“Two for the Money” didn’t blow away box office records with its opening weekend. It’s a difficult film to market – the TV ads are lackluster and not at all compelling – but this could be the sleeper movie of the year. Even viewers who aren’t sports fans will get caught up in the game between the characters, where the stakes are so much higher than just money.