The Hustler is one of those enduring classics which captures your attention from the outset, leaves you feeling good at the end, and only gets better with age and repeat viewings. For my money, the closing speech by Eddie Felson to Bert stands side-by-side with Jimmy Stewart’s famous bit from It’s a Wonderful Life and is just as impactful on how people watch movies after they’ve seen it. With Paul Newman delivering one of his better and more playful performances alongside George C. Scott’s stone-faced brilliance and Jackie Gleason’s big dramatic break, The Hustler deserves to be in that grouping of films that parents insist on watching with their children along with The Wizard of Oz and similar classics. The 50-year anniversary release from Fox restores the film’s beauty and offers up a surprising amount of extras to boot.
Eddie Felson (Paul Newman) fancies himself the best pool player around and to prove it to himself and everyone else he challenges Minnesota Fats (Jackie Gleason) to a high stakes game. Starting off strong with bravado and swagger, Felson discovers the true meaning of the "Tortoise and the Hare" fable, when the pool game turns out to be a competition of stamina as much as skill. After going from $18,000 ahead to broke in a game that lasts longer than a day, Eddie walks away a beaten man, his ego and spirit broken. Slinking off to a café at the train station, he meets Sarah (Piper Laurie), a student, and the two begin a romance as Eddie attempts to regain the confidence he lost at the hands of Minnesota Fats. Finally, he attracts the attention of Bert (George C. Scott), a wealthy financier looking for action, and learns the composure necessary to complement his skill and returns for a rematch with Minnesota Fats.
The Hustler is and isn’t an underdog story. After a loss to Minnesota Fats and an ego breakdown, the idea that he just might be a loser eats away at Eddie’s psyche, a degradation only compounded by some stupid mistakes that earn him a bit of physical pain. Thus, his fight back from that sunken self-esteem could make it sound like an underdog story, but as Eddie proves both in the beginning and at the end, he was always the more skilled of the duo. His loss didn’t come from a shortcoming in his ability but from a mental state that couldn’t grasp the long view of a hustle. He could enter a pool hall and bilk people of all they had, but if the hustle required him to stay on alert for a prolonged period of time, he didn’t have the fortitude.
Paul Newman’s Felson doesn’t have the same presence as his Cool Hand Luke, but it’s a much more flawed character. His growth has less to do with learning something measurable; instead he has to endure a certain level of emotional pain to give him the willpower and self-control to use what he already knows responsibly. Newman shows the growth expertly. George C. Scott does well as the cold and calculating man who can size up his opponents and employees and make the right move at the right time, he’s essentially Felson’s teacher for the lesson he never wanted to learn. Then there’s Gleason proving himself every bit as capable a dramatic actor as a comedian. Piper Laurie’s transformation as Sarah mirrors Felson’s own, only its interrupted midway through as a necessary device to propel Eddie forward. Performances of the entire cast are superb and it’s a testament to all of them that The Hustler still plays extremely well.
Blu-ray Bonus Features
Unlike some of the other commemorative Blu-ray book releases Fox has put out in the last few months, The Hustler's Blu-ray one comes jam-packed with extras whose total runtime exceeds the film itself by quite a bit. First the audio commentary has Paul Newman with others offering a retrospective look on the film, then there are profile pieces on Gleason, Paul Newman & Walter Tevis (the author of the book which inspired the film), two more that look at the historical significance of The Hustler as a film, two featurettes on pool instruction by Mike Massey, and the A&E Biography episode for Newman. Each is quite entertaining if not also insightful. Also, the "book" has color pages that offer cast and crew biographies and a historical account of the film.
"The Hustler" is on sale May 17, 2011 and is not rated. Drama. Directed by Robert Rossen. Written by Sidney Carroll, Robert Rossen. Starring Jackie Gleason, Paul Newman, Piper Laurie, George C Scott.
