Favorite Pool Movie

What's Your Favorite Pool Movie?

  • Hustler

    Votes: 34 53.1%

  • Color of Money

    Votes: 19 29.7%

  • Baltimore Bullet

    Votes: 2 3.1%

  • Poolhall Junkies

    Votes: 9 14.1%

  • Stickmen

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Total voters
    64
  • Poll closed .
jhendri2

jhendri2

Rack'em Sausage
Silver Member
In honor of Color Of Money being on Flix tonight, I decided to ask...What's your favorite pool movie?
 
I think it's pretty tough to beat "The Hustler". Jaickie Gleason, Paul Newman, Piper Laurie and George C. Scott were all phenominal. It would be tough to pick "Color of Money" over it because without it, "Money" wouldn't have happened.
 
I picked CoM. It was alot more about actual "pool" then the Hustler was. I totally love the Hustler but it is such a deep movie that pool is only part of what its about. CoM is alot more about the game. Plus I must say I love the downing of Fast Eddie at the hands of Forrest and his then rebirth getting glasses and a new outlook on life. Back to the basics and to a life he once knew and taking the same path as before yet this time with life experiance.

Honerable mention to the Baltimore Bullet, the pool scenes in it are awesome, and the amount of top pros in that movie is steller.

I am shocked PHJ has 2 votes already, that movie was shit.
 
My vote for best pool movie goes to The Color of Money. The Hustler was great, but pool was its vehicle more than its focus. The Color of Money was completely about pool. The small-time action, the big-time action, the tournament scene and the colorful characters that comprise the pool scene, are all presented objectively, and for the most part, accurately. The soul searching that a would-be hustler or road player must go through is also presented well. The Color of Money is not without a few flaws, but it shows the pool scene for what it is, and does it well.
 
The Hustler

Rickw said:
I think it's pretty tough to beat "The Hustler". Jaickie Gleason, Paul Newman, Piper Laurie and George C. Scott were all phenominal. It would be tough to pick "Color of Money" over it because without it, "Money" wouldn't have happened.
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I'm with you Rick, The Hustler was the best one by far in my book.
 
The Hustler - NO Contest!

The Hustler was Possible - The Color Of Money Wasn’t.
The Hustler told a story of how it was & could be.
The Color Of Money was just an exploitive attempt at fictionalizing the game.
I've been there, done that & Lived The Life For Over 20 Years, believe me, The Hustler was & is The Standard of ALL & ANY Pool Movies & Stories.
TY & GL
 
Not that it would be voted as a good pool movie, you forgot to include Whoopi Goldberg's, Kiss Shot that appeared on CBS TV some years back (94?).

I happened to record it at the time and watched it again a few months ago. It is about a woman who is close to losing her house to the mortgage company and she, through the help of that guy on the NY cop show, Dennis ____, decides the best way to get the money is by doing what she did in her youth, playing pool.

Whoopi really sucks at pool (and a lot else, imho), but the whole story is supposed to be predictable and lighthearted, as it is a network made-for-TV movie.

FYI,

Jeff Livingston

PS My vote for best movie in The Baltimore Bullet, corney in its protrayal, but verrrrrry timely with the current craze in poker, and actually more realistic than the others (except for the large amounts of money being bet).
 
Adding to my original post, one thing I really liked about The Color of Money was its skillful analysis of dumping.

From Fast Eddie’s vantage point, dumping went from being an undeniable and on-the-level aspect of betting on pool to a mildly objectionable and regrettable practice.

Vincent, at first, refused to dump, and it took a lot of disciplining from both his girlfriend and Fast Eddie to get him to start doing it. By the film’s end, dumping was an art that Vincent.had mastered.

I thought the evolution of the views of Fast Eddie and Vincent on dumping was a fascinating subplot within the film.
 
sjm said:
Adding to my original post, one thing I really liked about The Color of Money was its skillful analysis of dumping.

From Fast Eddie’s vantage point, dumping went from being an undeniable and on-the-level aspect of betting on pool to a mildly objectionable and regrettable practice.

Vincent, at first, refused to dump, and it took a lot of disciplining from both his girlfriend and Fast Eddie to get him to start doing it. By the film’s end, dumping was an art that Vincent.had mastered.

I thought the evolution of the views of Fast Eddie and Vincent on dumping was a fascinating subplot within the film.
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Good point, and I agree, sjm---your posts are always thoughtful and well written.

The one part I really hated was the "two men and a stranger" hustle. Hell, it wasn't even a hustle; it was outright theft. I thought it too bad that Fast Eddie, after years of contemplating pool philosophy, would be so anxious to use fraud, vs. skill, to steal someone else's money that way. I suppose when he forfeited at the end of the movie, he realized his mistake and changed his ways. We'll probably never know for sure as Paul is getting too old to do it again.

Who's next, Tom Cruise as the old fart and some babe as the up and coming hustler?

Oh well, it is just a movie.

Jeff Livingston
 
chefjeff said:
Good point, and I agree, sjm---your posts are always thoughtful and well written.

The one part I really hated was the "two men and a stranger" hustle. Hell, it wasn't even a hustle; it was outright theft. I thought it too bad that Fast Eddie, after years of contemplating pool philosophy, would be so anxious to use fraud, vs. skill, to steal someone else's money that way. I suppose when he forfeited at the end of the movie, he realized his mistake and changed his ways. We'll probably never know for sure as Paul is getting too old to do it again.

Who's next, Tom Cruise as the old fart and some babe as the up and coming hustler?

Oh well, it is just a movie.

Jeff Livingston
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First, Jeff, thanks for your kind words. I enjoy your posts, too.

Interesting point you raise about Newman's forfeit at the end. More than one interpretation is possible. Yours is probably right, though, for he hadn't earned the right to be in that match, so this forfeit may have been the manifestation of his guilty conscience, or even a soul-cleansing act of atonement.
 
ChefJeff,

I had forgotten all about "Kiss Shot" maybe that's a good thing. "Baltimore Bullet" as the best pool movie, huh...It's funny to watch the how corny that movie is.

I Like Hustler the best, if nothing else than for the first match between Fast Eddie and Fats, I think it's just a classic.

Jim
 
Those are good points for the The Color of Money. What I want to know is, who are the people that voted for Pool Hall Junkies? That movie was a real piece of shit!
 
My vote goes to the Hustler movie, but TCOM book over the movie. It told an entirely different story. However the TCOM movie would be a close second because of Paul Newman and other scences with KM and various pro players of the time. Oldhasbeen was right, it was more realistic and the way things were in pool back then.
 
If I were to direct that movie I would have Fast Eddie beat the kid badly in their last game which still leaves me thinking whom was best! I would also show more Hustler and Sharking gimmicks than was shown.
Jack Sharpe said:
The Color of Money is a great movie, come on guys where would the world be with out Grady Simmons.
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cut shot said:
If I were to direct that movie I would have Fast Eddie beat the kid badly in their last game which still leaves me thinking whom was best!
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Apparently neither you nor the director ever read the book....
 
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