I agree.
Did Brett Gordon break Eddies thumbs?
- Thread starter RunoutJJ
- Start date
At the high point, Charlie tells Eddie they're ahead by $18,000. That's $180,000 in today's money. Does anyone really think they're going to walk out of there alive with that kind of cash? Bert is part of the NYC underworld. No way are they leaving with his money.
If you believe otherwise, you're living in a fantasy world.
Bert and Fats know no one is getting out of there with their money. No one. So, either they win or they break even. Nice odds, huh?
It reminds me of the HBO series Deadwood. Anyone who attempted to leave, like the poor "Squareheads," got hit by Al Swearengen's road agents. You were dead going in.
If you believe otherwise, you're living in a fantasy world.
Bert and Fats know no one is getting out of there with their money. No one. So, either they win or they break even. Nice odds, huh?
It reminds me of the HBO series Deadwood. Anyone who attempted to leave, like the poor "Squareheads," got hit by Al Swearengen's road agents. You were dead going in.
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L.S. Dennis
Well-known member
I still have the VHS tape of this movie. With the possible exception of The Good The Bad and The Ugly I have never seen any movie more times in my life than 'The Hustler and I've never seen the picnic scene omitted. The casting in this film was superb. Gleason for fats was a no brainer, George C Scott for Bert Gordon was spot on. Many people didn't know that Mosconi's suggestion to the studios for the role of 'Fast Eddie' was originally a young Frank Sinatra. Willie mentions this in his autobiography. Also not universally known was that Mosconi was under contract at the time with Brunswick and had to get their permission to take part in this film. Brunswick at the time was trying trying put a 'cleaner' image of pool because pool was really in the doldrums but nothing seemed to work for them. I think that Brunswick just threw up their hands and said 'go ahead and do it Willie nothing we're doing seems to helping this game out anyway. The result as it turned out was a smash hit success and it was The Hustler that brought pool back in this country, for a while anyway!
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middleofnowhere
Registered
Yes I read that about Frank Sinatra. I also think that Jack lemmon in an interview one time said he was up for the part.
middleofnowhere
Registered
Yeah I've done that math too. Also at a point Charlie tells Eddie he wanted $10,000 you got $10,000. In other words they were going to quit the winner. Good luck with that.
L.S. Dennis
Well-known member
Lou, I remember talking to Dorothy's husband Jimmy Wise shortly after the film came out in the early sixties. He told me at that time it was widely expected that this film would have been the final nail in the coffin for pool. Jimmy wasn't wrong about too much when it came to all things pool! Fortunately he was wrong about this one!
OK, one more recollection:
The first time I saw “The Hustler" I was a teenager in high school back in the late 60’s.
By that time I’d already been playing pool for a bit after a friend, Jim, and I had killed a few hours at a bowling alley in Redwood City north of San Francisco, while his parents bowled. It was a common set up back then for Brunswick lanes to also have a pool room and we batted around the balls on an extra big table with 15 red balls and some numbered balls and had no idea what we were doing.
But we were hooked, or at least one of us was. A few weeks later we both bought personal cues and began to play on a regular basis at the Billiard Palacade on the corner of Mission and Geneva a few blocks from both of our houses. It was an old vaudeville theatre turned pool room that soon became my second home. But, as in so many things in life, inevitably one of us excelled awhile the other faltered. I began to deliver consistent beatings on Jim and after a while Jim could no longer make our match up dates with some regularity. I then began to play Guido, an older Italian gentleman with a huge white mustache and mane of hair who was a regular at the room. Soon I began to administer regular beat downs on Guido (but for unknown reasons he appeared to take some kind of crazy, fatherly pride in it all).
So like I said, I was in high school. One night in the downstairs room that my parents had carved out for me in our garage, for the first time on my 15” TV, I watched “The Hustler.”
Oh. My. God. Talk about hitting where you lived; right in the old solar plexus and grabbing you by the vitals. I was in — all in. I don’t think I can accurately describe how hard it hit me. Eddie, the road hustler with his manger in tow, walking into the big city, big money room where the pool tables were "the slabs they lay the stiffs on."
And then the match with Fats.
It just ate me up: the rail birds pulling up their seats for what they knew would be an epic battle, the placing of the bets, the ritualized racking of the balls, the calling out of every ball, the tapping of cues on the floor to acknowledge a great shot.
I was consumed.
Many, many years later I was channel surfing and Robert Osborne (RIP), TMC host, appeared seated in his chair taking about… “The Hustler.” How it was made, who was consider for the role of Fast Eddie (Tony Curtis, Cliff Robertson, Jack Lemmon, and Bobby Darin, while Kim Novak turned down the role of Sarah) and what Robert Rossen, the director, eventually decided to do. So I decide to watch for old times sake and came to discover they were broadcasting it in "letter box."
I’d never seen it in letterbox, having become accustomed to the square pan-and-scan version I’d watched many times before. And let me tell you: *the letterbox version of “The Hustler" is a revelation*. The wide screen shots in the pool room are fabulous — absolutely amazing. And in all their black and whiteness they take on the appearance of a classical Greek tableau. It’s almost like something by Da Vinci. Or at least good enough to win a couple of Academy Awards for cinematography and art direction.
“The Hustler” was huge for me and to this day remains a touchstone. I own two original movie posters, one for the original release and then the re-release a few years later, and I display them in our loft from time-to-time. And I also own a first edition of Tevis’ novel.
If you haven’t viewed the letterbox version I urge you to do so. And even if you have, give it another viewing. It’s amazing.
Lou Figueroa
The first time I saw “The Hustler" I was a teenager in high school back in the late 60’s.
By that time I’d already been playing pool for a bit after a friend, Jim, and I had killed a few hours at a bowling alley in Redwood City north of San Francisco, while his parents bowled. It was a common set up back then for Brunswick lanes to also have a pool room and we batted around the balls on an extra big table with 15 red balls and some numbered balls and had no idea what we were doing.
But we were hooked, or at least one of us was. A few weeks later we both bought personal cues and began to play on a regular basis at the Billiard Palacade on the corner of Mission and Geneva a few blocks from both of our houses. It was an old vaudeville theatre turned pool room that soon became my second home. But, as in so many things in life, inevitably one of us excelled awhile the other faltered. I began to deliver consistent beatings on Jim and after a while Jim could no longer make our match up dates with some regularity. I then began to play Guido, an older Italian gentleman with a huge white mustache and mane of hair who was a regular at the room. Soon I began to administer regular beat downs on Guido (but for unknown reasons he appeared to take some kind of crazy, fatherly pride in it all).
So like I said, I was in high school. One night in the downstairs room that my parents had carved out for me in our garage, for the first time on my 15” TV, I watched “The Hustler.”
Oh. My. God. Talk about hitting where you lived; right in the old solar plexus and grabbing you by the vitals. I was in — all in. I don’t think I can accurately describe how hard it hit me. Eddie, the road hustler with his manger in tow, walking into the big city, big money room where the pool tables were "the slabs they lay the stiffs on."
And then the match with Fats.
It just ate me up: the rail birds pulling up their seats for what they knew would be an epic battle, the placing of the bets, the ritualized racking of the balls, the calling out of every ball, the tapping of cues on the floor to acknowledge a great shot.
I was consumed.
Many, many years later I was channel surfing and Robert Osborne (RIP), TMC host, appeared seated in his chair taking about… “The Hustler.” How it was made, who was consider for the role of Fast Eddie (Tony Curtis, Cliff Robertson, Jack Lemmon, and Bobby Darin, while Kim Novak turned down the role of Sarah) and what Robert Rossen, the director, eventually decided to do. So I decide to watch for old times sake and came to discover they were broadcasting it in "letter box."
I’d never seen it in letterbox, having become accustomed to the square pan-and-scan version I’d watched many times before. And let me tell you: *the letterbox version of “The Hustler" is a revelation*. The wide screen shots in the pool room are fabulous — absolutely amazing. And in all their black and whiteness they take on the appearance of a classical Greek tableau. It’s almost like something by Da Vinci. Or at least good enough to win a couple of Academy Awards for cinematography and art direction.
“The Hustler” was huge for me and to this day remains a touchstone. I own two original movie posters, one for the original release and then the re-release a few years later, and I display them in our loft from time-to-time. And I also own a first edition of Tevis’ novel.
If you haven’t viewed the letterbox version I urge you to do so. And even if you have, give it another viewing. It’s amazing.
Lou Figueroa
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I totally agree with you!
L.S. Dennis
Well-known member
I seen that film so many time I think I almost know the complete dialogue of the script by heart! I think my favorite line from the film although there were so many good ones was where a clearly distraught and broken Findley (brilliantly played by Murry Hamilton) asks Bert while just having been beaten by Eddie and stumbling to his desk to pay Bert was 'will you take a check Bert?" Bert with a cold heart and steely eyes says "CASH !!!!!
Bert was not a member of the underworld -- he was professional gambler.
He played poker and won enough to buy a nice new car every year. He staked Fats and was willing to stake Eddie. Did he know guys who could back him up with muscle? Yes. But that's stock in trade for a guy like Bert.
Lou Figueroa
middleofnowhere
Registered
When I was young video tapes didn't exist. I actually recorded the Hustler off of the TV with my reel to reel tape recorder. And I would just play it back listening to the movie. Now that's really nuts.
