Cinema Sunday: The Hustler

In yesterday's Cinema Saturday, I posted about what many regard as the seminal motion picture about basketball, the 1986 film Hoosiers.Today's Cinema Sunday is about a movie about a whole other game, the game of pool and what is regarded as the best movie about life in pool halls.

From 1961, it's The Hustler.   

In the spirit of Wuthering Heights and From Here to Eternity which I've written about before, I must also say for The Hustler: "NOBODY in this DAMN MOVIE is HAPPY!! At all!"

Seriously! You have been warned.  

Meet "Fast Eddie" Felson, a man who wanders around the country with his partner Charlie, pool hall vagabonds who make a living conning pool players into thinking he's someone other than "Fast Eddie" Felson. Hustling suckers into making bets over what should be impossible trick shots, Eddie and Charlie line their pockets as they continue their journey.

Destination: New York City  

The target: Minnesota Fats, regarded as the best player in the country but Eddie aims to take him down.  

Curious and amused by this upstart punk, Fats agrees to take on Fast Eddie for $200 a game.

There are some ups and downs but eventually it looks like maybe Eddie is not just all talk and he's up $11,000.

A gambler in the crowd named Bert calls out Eddie as a "loser" to egg him on. 

Charlies thinks Eddie should stop while he's ahead but Eddie says the game ain't over until Fats says it's over. 

Eddie ups the bet to $1,000 a game and Fats says it's ain't over.

Long story made short: 25 hours and a lot of bourbon later, Eddie is down to his last $200 and now Fats declares the game is over.  

Reminder: "NOBODY in this DAMN MOVIE is HAPPY!! At all!"

After he parts ways with Charlies, Eddie meets Sarah Packard, an alcoholic. They begin a relationship and he moves in with her. 

Eddie encounters Bert who agrees to stake Eddie $3,000 in order to take on Minnesota Fats again in exchange for 75% of Eddie's winnings.   

Eddie tells Bert no and tries to raise his stake on his on by hustling pool along the waterfront.  Eddie gets his thumbs broken by a couple of thugs who do not appreciated being hustled.  

In case you have forgotten: "NOBODY in this DAMN MOVIE is HAPPY!! At all!"

After Eddie recovers from his injuries and is ready to play, he agrees to Bert's terms, deciding that a "25% slice of something big is better than a 100% slice of nothing".

Bert, Eddie, and Sarah travel to the Kentucky Derby, where Bert arranges a match for Eddie against a wealthy local socialite named Findley. 

The game goes badly and Sarah pleads for Eddie to leave but he refuses. Eddie is angry and determined to beat this SOB.

Eddie comes back to win $12,000. He collects his $3,000 share and returns to his hotel room where he finds that Sarah as killed herself. 

I know nobody in this damn movie is happy but come on! 

Eddie uses his $3,000 to stake a game against Minnesota Fats. Eddie wins again and again, beating Fats so badly that the legendary pool play is forced to quit. 

Even though he had fuck all to do with setting up the Eddie/Fats rematch, Bert shows up to demand half of Eddie's winnings under threat of having Eddie beaten up again.  

Eddie threatens Bert. If Eddie survives that beating, he will come back and kill Bert.  Eddie shames Bert into revoking his claim on Eddie's winnings.

Bert orders Eddie to never ever dare show his face a big-time pool hall again. Eddie and Fats compliment each other as players, and Eddie walks out.

And what have we learned: "NOBODY in this DAMN MOVIE is HAPPY!! At all!"

The closest we get to any kind of happiness in this movie is the sequence where Eddie and Sarah live together in domestic bliss except it's less happiness and more a dull tolerable level of survival. Sarah struggles with her addiction as Eddie anxiously chomps at the bit to get back into the pool halls. 

This is a very powerful movie and every body acts the hell out of the thing. Paul Newman brings a laser focused intensity to the role of Fast Eddie, his devotion to his craft as a pool player and the pain and anguish at all he loses to that devotion are palpable.  

Jackie Gleason's role as Minnesota Fats may be a bit of a shock for those who associate Gleason with more comedic roles but his role as Fats is an incredible display of dramatic nuance. 

Piper Laurie as Sarah gives a powerful performance of someone struggling with loss and weakness and falling into a pit of despair for having hitched her dreams to Fast Eddie. 

Bert is a total prick and  George C. Scott is really good at that. 

By 1961, there were cracks appearing in the stranglehold of Hays Office movie production code.  Eddie and Sarah live together without being married and the level of violence of the attack on Fast Eddie's thumbs are example of the producers not adhering to the code. 

The Hustler was a commercial and critical success when it was released in 1961, quickly gaining a reputation as a modern classic.

In 1997, the Library of Congress selected The Hustler for preservation in the United States National Film Registry as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

 The Academy Film Archive preserved The Hustler in 2003.

A 1986 sequel, The Color of Money, starred Newman reprising his role as Felson, for which he won his only Academy Award.

And most importantly, remember this about The Hustler: "NOBODY in this DAMN MOVIE is HAPPY!! At all!"

Next week's Weekend Movies are set in small towns where there's trouble a brewin' if those the grown ups would listen to those dang meddlin' kids already.

Cinema Saturday - Ghostbusters: Afterlife 

Cinema Sunday  - The Blob