Pool Hall Junkies

"Confessions of a Pool Hustler"

Hey pool players ! First of all I fully agree on what y'all said about the silly shot at the end of the movie, the graphite shaft and Schroeders bridge ! But let me give y'all some insight of how the whole movie went down. As you all know I did all the trick shots in the movie and was the tech advisor as well. The movie actually started off before it was written with me telling road stories to Mars and Chris sitting around the Hollywood Athelectic Club ( nicest poolroom in L.A.). So Mars and Chris decided to write a movie based on my tales. It took like ten years to get a buyer for the movie, many producers bought the rites to the movie, called opting out, and each time is was opted out they wanted some thing re-written. So the final script was different than the original, better or worse who knows ! When they hired Rick schroeder they told me that I had to teach him how to look like a pool player..... well I met him at a place in Santa Monica called Que's. I asked him if he had ever played pool before and he said no, I'm thinking well thats ok cause I can get him looking good in about maybe 10 lessons. Well come to find out he only had time for a one hour lesson then he had to fly out of town. I knew that this might be impossible. Well after a very intense hour I did have him where he could make a few balls, he could not make a closed bridge no matter how hard he tried . That was just a start of all of the problems..... next page
 
"Confessions of a Pool Hustler"

OK here we go.....Well we get to Salt Lake city where the movie was filmed. The movie only had a 5 million dollar budget wich is next to nothing. Walken and Chazz starred in this movie for a favor to Mars, not full pay, while it was being filmed if walken did his scene like he wanted and I happen to see a problem with a shot, bridge etc. I had my hands tied, Walken and Chazz werent gonna do there scene over just cuz I saw something I didnt like. When I was in the scene and Mars said that I had the best break in the world, I wanted to crash the balls and have whitey jump and and squat dead center ! I was voted down, they thought it wouls look better on camera if the cue ball went back and forth across the table... wrong ! The scene at the very start when the kid was suppoesed to be a young Mars was gonna shoot his scene in about ten minutes, he told Mars that he was a pretty good pool player so I wasnt worried. Well he had to shoot this shot and draw his ball about a foot. He walked with me over to the pool table so I could make sure he could do it ! He layed his hand on the table with an upside down V bridge, shit I knew I was screwed, I only had 5 minutes to get this kid to make a correct bridge and drwa his ball ! Well i DID IT, he looked great ! next page later
 
m79a said:
Why on Earth do they have Ricky Schroder Playing with a cue that appear to have a graphite shaft?
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When you realize all these movies(from the Hustler till today's) truly have nothing to do with pool/billiards,just have it in them.........you'll get it
 
How would you rate "Stick Men"? I quit in disgust after about 10 minutes. Should I have given it a longer look?

Dave Nelson
 
I liked it. It's like watching fast and the furious. That was nothing like actual racing but it was still fun to watch! It's not a documentary it's a movie lol
 
It was just a horrible movie. Regardless of pool. Haven't seen it in ages. Just remember I think the stars brother was hanging with his posse. They looked like 30 year olds acting like they were in high school. And they said boobies alot or something like that. I was really tempted to turn it off.but ill watch anything. Wish i could sue to get the 2 hours of my life back.
 
I liked it ok.

It wasn't any worse than Color Of Money. CoM could have been a lot better, but even Newman's fine job couldn't rescue that movie from the bad plot/pacing and horrific acting from Cruise.


Someone told me once that Cruise's character was supposed to be so annoying and irritating you viscerally hated him and wished to punch him in the face the entire movie. If so, Cruise should have won an Oscar that year.
 
m79a said:
Why on Earth do they have Ricky Schroder Playing with a cue that appear to have a graphite shaft?
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Here's the most honest-to-goodness answer I can come up with...

The protagonist and the antagonist of the movie have to look, at face value, different from one another. The easiest way to do this is to give one of them a bunch of gimmicks (the instrument case for the cues, the graphite, etc.). On top of that, it gives a little bit of shock value to the regular viewer, who thinks, "Oh wow, I haven't seen that in the movie so far... That must be some secret pro thing. This guy must be good!"

Think about how different the movie would've felt if JOHNNY had the graphite cue.
 
I've always liked PHJ. I watch it occasionally on the Tube.
I take it for what it was meant to be, a movie about pool with a bit of drama added for a story line.

I'll take it over TCOM any day.
 
What about the 'crease in the pants'? When the guy can tell Walken has been playing pool because of the crease in his pants. Couldn't they have put chalk on his fingers or something? Has anyone gotten a 'crease on their pants' after playing pool? And then... so unique that "it can only be caused by leaning on a pool table"?

Sent from my BlackBerry 9780 using Tapatalk
 
Bobby Cotton ????????

Bobby, I understand what you are saying.
The making of a movie is not based on the actual story, but what the director, screen writer and producer think is right.

It must have been frustrating.

Ian is 2nd director on the new Star Trek movie.

Best wishes to you and your family.

Take Care, Barney
 
pt109 said:
I agree with you about the graphite cue..a little r&d would not have allowed that...
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Absolutely...

Growing up, and into my early/mid 20's, I was SERIOUSLY into comic books. Spider-Man, Superman, Batman (my personal favorite, and way before the 1989 film with Nicholson and Keaton came out).
So whenever a 'comic book' movie came out, I was told my opinion was always 'biased' (due to my afforementioned comic book knowledge).

I never understood that... THOSE are the people that will scrutinize every aspect of the movie. Those are also the people that will either praise or condemn it.

I'm not a NASCAR fan (I can watch it, but I'd rather be playing pool). I thought "Days of Thunder" was an 'ok' movie.
My uncle follows NASCAR...
- "Who has ONE GUY build the race car ?"
- "They weren't at the tracks the movie said they were at."
(He had a lot more to say regarding the perceived 'factual' parts of the movie, but these are the two that stick out in my mind).

BWTadpole said:
... The protagonist and the antagonist of the movie have to look, at face value, different from one another. The easiest way to do this is to give one of them a bunch of gimmicks (the instrument case for the cues, the graphite, etc.)...
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Much respect, BWT. I can see what you're saying...

But I also think that the director could have scored some serious bonus points with the poolplaying crowd if he gave Mars a sneaky pete, and Schroder's character something like one of Pechauer's "Crown Jewel" cues.

I think it would have behooved someone involved with the movie to stop by a couple of poolhalls and ask what kind of cue would be easily recognized on the big screen...
 
I thought the movie sucked, but thouroughly enjoyed watching it, for all of the reasons that the posters in this thread have pointed out. I do wish, however, that someone in Hollywood would come up with a really good pool movie, like the original pool movie "The Hustler". Maybe a movie about the life of Willie Mosconi? Could also explore some of the other pool greats that were around in his time. Pool needs another kick in the arse like TH and TCOM provided. Get the younger gens off their vid games and phones.
 
12310bch said:
WTF? Who the hell are you to tell us what to post? TX Pool Nut has 9902 posts and I, another smartass, have 1992 posts. You the smartass police? Dumbass original post anyway. :kma:
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There are 'smartass' police????:yikes:

I gotta get a lawyer.
 
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