The Hustler

When all is said and done, Paul Newman's greatest role was probably Fast Eddie Felson in The Hustler (25 years later he would reprise the role in The Color of Money and cop his first competitive Oscar, perhaps that was guilt for passing him over in 1961 for the first film). Directed by Robert Rossen, The Hustler is a certified classic, a film that will long be admired and dissected.

The tale of a small-time pool shark who wants to hit the big-time, the film takes the structure of the classic hero's journey. After a pre-credit sequence that shows how Newman and his partner hustle unsuspecting suckers in small-town pool rooms, the film settles in for a long scene in which Newman goes to New York City and the home base of Minnesota Fats, the preeminent pool shooter in the country. Memorably played by Jackie Gleason, Fats is a big man but a dandy, wearing a carnation and shooting in a three-piece suit. After he powders his hand with chalk Newman tells him, "Fats, you look just like a baby--clean and pink and powdered."

Newman is beating Fats, but his hubris gets the best of him, and he ends up defeated and humiliated. He skips out on his partner, and must make the long journey to find the character to beat Gleason in a rematch. He does this by bottoming out and finding love with a cynical woman of questionable morals, Piper Laurie. Two broken people, their love affair is like a flower poking through asphalt, but it's imperiled when George C. Scott, as a ruthless gambler, takes over Newman's career by putting up the money for him to take on opponents. Scott is memorably slimy as a man with no soul, his only consideration the avarice that festers inside him.

The best scenes in this film are in the Ames pool room, which was an actual location in New York's Times Square. The cinematographer, Eugene Shufton, makes brilliant use of the light in this and other pool room locations in the film (he won an Oscar for his efforts). Rossen, as director, doesn't make a wrong shot, especially in these scenes. The middle section, with Newman and Laurie, drags a little bit, as we want to see Newman back shooting pool, especially in a rematch with Gleason. It's well worth the wait.

Newman, according to the backstory, had never held a cue stick before this film. He was coached by Willie Mosconi, who made the difficult shots as a stunt shooter (Rossen would shoot Newman in closeup, then cut to the hands of Mosconi, all very seamlessly). Gleason was a good enough player not to need a stand-in. Newman, Scott, Gleason and Laurie were all nominated for Oscars (in a harbinger of things to come, Scott asked that his name be removed. It was not).

Even if you've never been in a pool room before, after watching this film you'll feel like you have, as Rossen and his team create an authentic world, and spin a yarn that is eternal.