Diksha Sundriyal
In Netflix’s ‘Ballad of a Small Player,’ Colin Farrell stars as Lord Doyle, a gambling addict who needs a miracle to get him out of trouble. His addiction has buried him in debt, and all the debt collectors have come calling. In the hopes of turning around his fate, he goes to Rainbow Casino, where he comes across a loan shark named Dao Ming. At first, she offers him money, but later, she changes her mind. As Doyle tries to convince her to give him the money, which he is sure will turn into big winnings through which he can pay off both of their debts, she leaves him with a cryptic number on his hand and mysteriously disappears. Doyle doesn’t understand the meaning of these numbers until much later, and that’s when the wind of change finally starts to blow. SPOILERS AHEAD.
The Numbers Open the Door to a Second Chance for Lord Doyle
When Lord Doyle crosses paths with Dao Ming, he is in desperate need of money. He needs to pay off massive debts to keep himself from being thrown into prison. But the money he wants from Dao Ming is not to pay off those debts. It is to gamble them with the hope that he will win, and through those winnings, he will get the creditors off his back. On the night of the Festival of Hungry Ghosts, he connects with Dao Ming, recognizing a kindred spirit in her. He makes her the proposition, promising to take care of both of their debts so that they will be free of their problems and can start anew. The next morning, he wakes up with no Dao Ming and a number on his palm. He doesn’t know what this number means, and Dao Ming is nowhere to be found.
Having found the postcard of Lamma Island in her house, Doyle knows that she lives there. So, when things get from bad to worse and he is forced to leave Macau for Hong Kong, he finds Dao Ming, who takes him to her house. When he asks her what the numbers are, she tells him it’s a test. Later, when she leaves again, Doyle comes across a locked room. He realizes that the numbers are the key to the door, and when he opens it, he finds her stash of money. She told him that she’d collected this money to send back home, hoping that she would be forgiven for stealing from her father and running away from home at a young age. However, her mother didn’t accept the money and sent it back, showing Dao Ming that there is no forgiving or redemption for her. At first, it seems that the test is whether Doyle will wait for Dao Ming to come back or if he will betray her and run away with the money. He does the latter, and fortunately, his luck changes and he wins big enough to pay off all his debts.
In the end, he returns to Rainbow Casino to find Dao Ming and give her the share he’d promised to her the night of the festival. This is when he discovers that she died that night. It turns out that that night, before she walked into the river, never to come out again, she decided to leave her money to Doyle, in the hopes that it would work out for him, even when it didn’t work out for her. It was her gift to him, and the real test was what he did with the money. Doyle could have used it to pay off his debts, but it was just a fraction of what he owed. So, he stuck with the original plan and took the gamble. Fortunately for him, Dao Ming’s ghost became the angel on his shoulder, who brought him out of rock bottom and became the reason for his unprecedented winning streak. This allowed Doyle to pay the creditors and free himself, and letting go of the money allowed Dao Ming to be freed too, rather than turning into a hungry ghost, cursed to remain unfulfilled for all eternity.
Read More: Ballad of a Small Player Ending Explained: Is Dao Ming Dead?
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