Eddie scams some locals!	Fats and Eddie start the first match.	The stakes get higher.(Mosconi gets money)

Cocky, over-confident Eddie hits the bottle.	Fats exuberates coolness!	Bert tells Fats to keep playing the loser!

Leonard Maltin Review: 4.0 stars out of 4

Newman is outstanding as disenchanted drifter and pool hustler who challenges legendary Minnesota Fats (Gleason). Dingy pool-hall atmosphere is vividly realized in this incisive film. Cinematographer Eugen Schüfftan won an Oscar for his work. Walter Tevis novel adapted by Sidney Carroll and director Rossen for the screen. Followed years later by sequel, THE COLOR OF MONEY. CinemaScope.

Charlie tries to tell Eddie to quit while he's ahead.	Down after losing big, Eddie meets Sarah.	Caught hustling, Eddie gets his thumbs broken!

CineBooks' Motion Picture Guide Review: 5.0 stars out of 5

135 min, No rating, Black & White, Available on videocassette and laserdisc Paul Newman was only a promising and somewhat successful actor until performing the part of the brash, lonely, love-and-reputation seeking poolshark, "Fast" Eddie Felson. This single role turned Newman's career and made him an overnight superstar. Synopsis A young hustler. Street-smart and poolroom-wise, "Fast" Eddie Felson (Newman), accompanied by an elderly sidekick and shill Charlie (Myron McCormick), plays the come-on game with local shooters. He first allows them to win game after game, making small bets and losing, letting the adversary gloat and inflate his own prowess to the point where the other player suggests raising the stakes. Once the big bets are down Fast Eddie goes to work, making enough spectacular shots, seemingly aided by luck, to take the winnings and leave the sucker high and dry. Beginning in California, Fast Eddie and Charlie work their way across the country until arriving in New York. Minnesota Fats. The two go to Ames, a second-story poolroom, the most prestigious poolhall in the U.S., site of great historic matches and the stomping grounds for the most brilliant pool player alive, Minnesota Fats, (Jackie Gleason). Fast Eddie hangs around until Minnesota Fats shows up and then proposes a game with heavy stakes. Minnesota Fats looks over to a sinister-looking man in an expensive business suit Bert (George C. Scott), who nods, Bert is Minnesota Fats's backer and the one who gives him the go-ahead. Fast Eddie and Minnesota Fats begin a Homeric struggle on the green felt table with Fast Eddie gaining ground with each game. Hours go by, the games more and more quickly decided by Fast Eddie's incredible shots. Flush with victory and tens of thousands of dollars ahead, Fast Eddie watches in admiration as Minnesota Fats, in dapper dress, pauses to wash and tidy up, applying powder to his face and hands, then giving a gofer some money to buy some expensive liquor. "Fats, you're beautiful," gushes Fast Eddie. "All pink-just like a baby." Fast Eddie orders some booze and then Minnesota Fats, appearing as fresh as when the monumental battle began, says: "Let's play some pool." When the liquor arrives, the strutting Fast Eddie begins to drink heavily, then he starts to miss some shots. Slowly the struggle begins to shift. By dawn the next day Fast Eddie and his bankroll are exhausted. He begs the triumphant Minnesota Fats for one more game, but Minnesota Fats, with a sideways glance at the ever watchful Bert, refuses. It's strictly a cash-and-carry situation. Fast Eddie, utterly destroyed, leaves Ames a wreck. Preparation. Fast Eddie later stops in a cheap restaurant and there meets a young and attractive hooker Sarah Packard (Piper Laurie) so world-weary that her only desire is to drink. Jaded, alcoholic, and afflicted with a crippled leg, she nevertheless goes off with Fast Eddie, taking him back to her apartment where they set up housekeeping. Charlie visits them and Fast Eddie accuses him of holding out on him, which he admits, turning over a small grubstake. Fast Eddie then tells Charlie to disappear. Fast Eddie goes off on his own, frequenting small, out-of-the-way poolhalls and mean bars with pool tables, hustling the suckers. In one bar another hustler so riles Fast Eddie that he pulls out all the stops and utterly devastates his opponent. It's obvious to all that this is a hustler and after Fast Eddie picks up his winnings, he is dragged behind a partition where thugs break his thumbs. He shows up at Sarah's apartment in great pain, and she nurses him back to health.

Sarah takes him in.	Bert takes Eddie and Sarah on the road.	Eddie beats Findlay at Billiards.

Once recovered, Fast Eddie tries to regain his status by becoming a contract pool player for sports promoter Bert, a manipulative, sadistic creature who takes him and Sarah to Louisville during Kentucky Derby week, spending lavishly on them, getting them suites in the celebrated Brown's Hotel. Bert pits Fast Eddie against a wealthy player Findlay (Murray Hamilton), who takes them to his private poolroom in his mansion. Only then is it revealed that the game is billiards, not pool. "My house, my game," the smug Findlay says. Bert wants to leave, believing that Fast Eddie can't beat Findlay at billiards, but Fast Eddie begs to play and Bert puts up $1,000. Fast Eddie quickly loses and Bert is about to pack it in until he sees Fast Eddie cruelly reject Sarah's entreaties to leave. He again backs Fast Eddie and, with Sarah gone, Fast Eddie soundly beats Findlay. Back at the hotel, Fast Eddie finds Sarah in a drunken stupor and leaves her alone in the room. Bert enters from his adjoining suite and approaches Sarah. In the following scene, Fast Eddie returns to his room to find it full of police detectives. Sarah is dead in the bathroom, a suicide, and a bleary Bert is seated on the bed answering police questions. Fast Eddie quickly surmises the situation and goes berserk, attempting to attack Bert, but is stopped by the police officers. Final showdown. Later Fast Eddie shows up at Ames, going to a table, opening the case in which he carries his specially made pool cue, and assembling it. He challenges Minnesota Fats to another game. Bert nods his approval and Fast Eddie proceeds to destroy Minnesota Fats in game after game, methodically winning with one brilliant shot after another. He soon pockets an enormous bankroll, his winnings, but Bert yells at him: "You owe me money!" Fast Eddie refuses to pay him his percentage, telling Bert that what he has just done, he has done for the memory of the dead Sarah and then indicts himself and Bert for being inhuman and equally responsible for her death. "We killed her, Bert." When some goons make a move to attack Fast Eddie, Bert calls them off, telling Fast Eddie to go but he warns him: "Don't ever walk into a big-time poolroom again." Fast Eddie leaves and so too does Minnesota Fats, as the occupants of Ames are caught in a freeze frame. Critique Grim chivalry. Director Robert Rossen, whose personal project this was, offers a grim, dirty world to the viewer here, one where the only bright spot is the top of the pool table, but, in their lowly ways, the leads have their share of chivalry. Rossen became seriously ill following the completion of the film, and told associates that he could now die in peace, that THE HUSTLER was the best film he had ever made (he would make one more film, LILITH in 1964, before dying in 1966). Excellent performances. The scenes have no waste and the acting is excellent. Gleason is probably the most empathetic of the lot, a cool, detached technician with style, grace, wit, and charm. It is Gleason, with one sad look, who captures a lonely courage in the tawdry poolhall world. Newman's passionate portrayal added a new dimension to his acting ability. Laurie, despite her drunkenness and self-pity, still manages to exude steamy sex and glimmers of schoolgirl hope. This was undoubtedly her finest role. Scott is evil incarnate, a Mephisto in a tailor-made suit, whose hatred for humanity oozes through every pore. His is a role that will also be long remembered. Background Practice and superstition. The great pool player, Willie Mosconi, coached Gleason and Newman in their shots, making those himself that were shot in close-up. Newman practiced pool shooting obsessively; he trained at home every night. He would clear his dining room of furniture and roll in the pool table. He later said: "I would spend many happy hours playing with Mosconi. What I called a perfect way to rehearse a part-" The film also remains one of Newman's personal favorites, but then he reportedly has a fixation for any film in which he appeared that begins with the letter 'H,' and some later claimed that he insisted upon having his films begin with that letter for luck. Given the spate of such films-HUD (1963), HARPER (1966), HOMBRE (1967) , and THE HUSTLER, all blockbusters-there might be something to this supposed superstition. Awards THE HUSTLER garnered nine Oscar nominations, but won only for Best Black-and-White Cinematography and Best Black-and-White Art Direction. The other nominations were for Best Picture (won by WEST SIDE STORY), Best Director, Best Actor (Newman), Best Actress (Laurie), Best Supporting Actor (Scott and Gleason), and Best Screenplay. Clearly, Newman deserved an Oscar for his role here (he lost to Maximilian Schell's rather ordinary performance in JUDGMENT AT NUREMBERG, 1961). Ironically, in 1986, twenty-five years later, he would finally win an Oscar as he again played Fast Eddie Felson in a sequel to THE HUSTLER: THE COLOR OF MONEY.

Eddies grieves and blames Bert for girlfriends' suicide!	Fats concedes after losing to Eddie and says it's over.	Bert tells Eddie don't ever step in a big time pool hall again.

Academy Awards(r)


(c) A.M.P.A.S.(r)
Nominated for Best Picture 1961: Robert Rossen - Producer
Nominated for Actor 1961: Paul Newman
Nominated for Actress 1961: Piper Laurie
Nominated for Supporting Actor 1961: George C. Scott
Nominated for Supporting Actor 1961: Jackie Gleason
Nominated for Directing 1961: Robert Rossen
Nominated for Writing (Best Screenplay based on material from another medium) 1961: Sidney Carroll, Robert Rossen
Art Direction/Set Decoration (Black and White) 1961: Harry Horner - Art Direction, Gene Callahan - Set Decoration
Cinematography (Black and White) 1961: Eugen Schüfftan

Cast List


Paul Newman - "Fast" Eddie Felson
Jackie Gleason - Minnesota Fats
Piper Laurie - Sarah Packard,
George C. Scott - Bert Gordon
Myron McCormick - Charlie Bums
Murray Hamilton - Findlay,
Michael Constantine - Big John
Stefan Gierasch - Preacher
Jake LaMotta - Bartender,
Gordon B. Clarke - Cashier
Alexander Rose - Scorekeeper/Coates/Waitress
Carl York - Young Hustler
Vincent Gardenia - Bartender
Gloria Curtis - Girl with Fur Coat
Charles Dierkop and Donald Crabtree and Brendan Fay-Pool Room Hoods
Cliff Pellow, Willie Mosconi, Don De Leo, Tom Ahearne

Production Credits


Producer - Robert Rossen
Director - Robert Rossen
Screenwriter - Sidney Carroll and Robert Rossen
based on the novel by Walter Tevis
Cinematographer - Eugene Schuftan
Editor - Dede Allen
Composer - Kenyon Hopkins
Production designer - Harry Horner
Art director - Albert Brenner and Harry Horner Set designer - Gene Callahan
Costumes - Ruth Morley
Makeup - Bob Jiras
Technical effects - Willie Mosconi

The Bartender is about to be had!	It' like your worst nightmare!(Keith McCready)	The threesome on the road.

Roger Ebert Review: 2.5 stars out of 4

If this movie had been directed by someone else, I might have thought differently about it because I might not have expected so much. But THE COLOR OF MONEY is directed by Martin Scorsese, the most exciting American director now working, and it is not an exciting film. It doesn't have the electricity, the wound-up tension of his best work, and as a result I was too aware of the story marching by. Scorsese may have thought of this film as a deliberately mainstream work, a conventional film with big names and a popular subject matter; perhaps he did it for that reason. But I believe he has the stubborn soul of an artist, and cannot put his heart where his heart will not go. And his heart, I believe, inclines toward creating new and completely personal stories about characters who have come to life in his imagination-not in finishing someone else's story, begun twenty-five years ago. THE COLOR OF MONEY is not a sequel, exactly, but it didn't start with someone's fresh inspiration. It continues the story of "Fast Eddie" Felson, the character played by Paul Newman in Robert Rossen's THE HUSTLER (1961). Now twenty-five years have passed. Eddie still plays pool, but not for money and not with the high-stakes, dangerous kinds of players who drove him from the game. He is a liquor salesman, a successful one, judging by the long, white Cadillac he takes so much pride in. One night, he sees a kid playing pool, and the kid is so good that Eddie's memories are stirred. This kid is not simply good, however. He is also, Eddie observes, a "flake," and that gives him an idea: With Eddie as his coach, this kid could be steered into the world of big-money pool, where his flakiness would throw off the other players. They wouldn't be inclined to think he was for real. The challenge, obviously, is to train the kid so he can turn his flakiness on and off at will-so he can put the making of money above every other consideration, every other lure and temptation, in the pool hall. The kid is named Vincent (Tom Cruise), and Eddie approaches him through Vincent's girlfriend, Carmen (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio). She is a few years older than Vince and a lot tougher. She likes the excitement of being around Vince and around pool hustling, but Eddie sees she's getting bored. He figures he can make a deal with the girl; together, they'll control Vince and steer him in the direction of money.

The Hustler gets hustled!	New glasses make a differance!	Eddie drinks while Dud racks!(Grady Mathews)

A lot of the early scenes setting up this situation are very well handled, especially the moments when Eddie uses Carmen to make Vince jealous and undermine his self-confidence. But of course these scenes work well, because they are the part of the story that is closest to Scorsese's own sensibility. In all of his best movies, we can see this same ambiguity about the role of women, who are viewed as objects of comfort and fear, creatures that his heroes desire and despise themselves for desiring. Think of the heroes of MEAN STREETS, TAXI DRIVER, and RAGING BULL and their relationships with women, and you sense where the energy is coming from that makes Vincent love Carmen, and distrust her. The movie seems less at home with the Newman character, perhaps because this character is largely complete when the movie begins. "Fast Eddie" Felson knows who he is, what he thinks, what his values are. There will be some moments of crisis in the story, as when he allows himself, to his shame, to be hustled at pool. But he is not going to change much during the story, and maybe he's not even free to change much, since his experiences are largely dictated by the requirements of the plot. Here we come to the big weakness of THE COLOR OF MONEY: It exists in a couple of timeworn genres, and its story is generated out of standard Hollywood situations. First we have the basic story of the old pro and the talented youngster. Then we have the story of the kid who wants to knock the master off the throne. Many of the scenes in this movie are almost formula, despite the energy of Scorsese's direction and the good performances. They come in the same places we would expect them to come in a movie by anybody else, and they contain the same events. Eventually, everything points to the ending of the film, which we know will have to be a showdown between Eddie and Vince, between Newman and Cruise. The fact that the movie does not provide that payoff scene is a disappointment. Perhaps Scorsese thought the movie was "really" about the personalities of his two heroes, and that it was unnecessary to show who would win in a showdown. Perhaps, but then why plot the whole story with genre formulas and only bail out at the end? If you bring a gun onstage in the first act, you've gotta shoot somebody by the third. The side stories are where the movie really lives. There is a warm, bittersweet relationship between Newman and his long-time girlfriend, a bartender wonderfully played by Helen Shaver. And the greatest energy in the story is generated between Cruise and Mastrantonio-who, with her hard edge and her inbred cynicism, keeps the kid from ever feeling really sure of her. It's a shame that even the tension of their relationship is allowed to evaporate in the closing scenes, where Cruise and the girl stand side by side and seem to speak from the same mind, as if she were a standard movie girlfriend and not a real original. Watching Newman is always interesting in this movie. He has been a true star for many years, but sometimes that star quality has been thrown away. Scorsese has always been the kind of director who lets his camera stay on actors' faces, who looks deeply into them and tries to find the shadings that reveal their originality. In many of Newman's close-ups in this movie, he shows an enormous power, a concentration and focus of his essence as an actor. Newman, of course, had veto power over who would make this movie (because how could they make it without him?), and his instincts were sound in choosing Scorsese. Maybe the problems started with the story, when Newman or somebody decided that there had to be a young man in the picture; the introduction of the Cruise character opens the door for all of the preordained teacher-pupil clichés, when perhaps they should have just stayed with Newman, and let him be at the center of the story. Then Newman's character would have been free (as the Robert De Niro characters have been free in other Scorsese films) to follow his passions, hungers, fears, and desires wherever they led him-instead of simply following the story down a well-traveled path.

Let the games begin.	I didn't deserve that! (Steve Mizerak)	Vince whips up on Grady Seasons.

Pauline Kael Review

119 min, Rated R, Color, Available on videocassette and laserdisc This Martin Scorsese film takes up Paul Newman as Fast Eddie Felson 25 years after the close of the 1961 Robert Rossen film THE HUSTLER, in which Eddie, the new poolroom champion, quit the game rather than spoil it by truckling to the crooked manager who had staked him. Now he's a silver-haired Chicago liquor salesman who drives a white Cadillac and wears a neat mustache and natty duds, a likable cynical sharpie who himself stakes young hustlers (for 60 per cent of their winnings). When he sees the raw, cocky upstart Vincent (Tom Cruise), he makes a deal to train the kid. Newman brings off some beautiful smiling deviltry. The kick he gets out of acting is inseparable from Eddie's con artistry, and, with the help of pungent lowlife dialogue by Richard Price, who wrote the script, he carries the action along. The picture might have been a pop classic if it had stayed near the level of impudence that it reaches at its best. But about midway Fast Eddie has a crisis of conscience, or something, and when Eddie locks his jaw and sets forth to become a purified man of integrity the joy goes out of Newman's performance, which (despite the efforts of a lot of good actors) is the only life in the movie, except for a brief, startling performance by the 25-year-old black actor Forest Whitaker as a pool shark called Amos. With Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Helen Shaver, John Turturro, and Bill Cobbs. Cinematography by Michael Ballhaus; score by Robbie Robertson; production design by Boris Leven; editing by Thelma Schoonmaker. Academy Award for Best Actor (Newman). Touchstone (Disney). For a more extended discussion, see Pauline Kael's book Hooked.

Julian and friend (Jimmy Mataya) preparing for the tournament!	Vince beats Mossel but looses chance of big money in the long run!	Eddie's gets upset when Vince tells him he dumped!

Academy Awards(r)

119 min, Rated R, Color, Available on videocassette and laserdisc
(c) A.M.P.A.S.(r)
Actor 1986: Paul Newman
Nominated for Supporting Actress 1986: Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio
Nominated for Writing (Best Screenplay based on material from another medium) 1986: Richard Price
Nominated for Art Direction/Set Decoration 1986: Boris Leven - Art Direction, Karen A. O'Hara - Set Decoration

Cast List

119 min, Rated R, Color, Available on videocassette and laserdisc
Paul Newman - Eddie,
Tom Cruise - Vincent,
Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio - Carmen,
Helen Shaver - Janelle,
John Turturro - Julian,
Bill Cobbs - Orvis,
Keith McCready - Grady Seasons,
Carol Messing - Casino Bar Band Singer/Julian's Flirt,
Steve Mizerak - Duke (Eddie's 1st Opponent),
Bruce A. Young - Moselle,
Randall Arney and Lisa Dodson - Child World Customers,
Vito D'Ambrosio - Lou in Child World,
Ron Dean - Guy in Crowd,
Donald A. Feeney and Andy Nolfo - Referees,
Paul Geier - "Two Brothers/Stranger" Player,
Carey Goldenberg and Lawrence Linn and Rick Mohr and Rodrick Selby - Congratulating Spectators,
Joe Guastaferro - Chuck the Bartender,
Paul Herman - Player in Casino Bar,
Mark Jarvis - Guy at Janelle's,
Jim Mataya - Julian's Friend in Green Room,
Grady Mathews - Dud,
Lloyd Moss - Narrator at Resorts International,
Michael Nash - Moselle's Opponent,
Mario Nieves and Miguel A. Nino and Juan Ramirez - Latinos,
Jerry Piller - Tom,
Iggy Pop - Skinny Player on the Road,
Richard Price - Guy Who Calls Dud,
Alex Ross - Bartender Who Bets,
Charles Scorsese and Fred Squillo - High Rollers
Christina Sigel - Waitress,
Harold L. Simonsen - Tournament Chief Justice,
Peter Saxe and Brian Sunina and Jim Widlowski - Casino Bar Band Members,
Wandachristine - Casino Clerk,
Forest Whitaker - Amos

Production Credits


Producer - Irving Axelrad,Barbara De Fina
Director - Martin Scorsese
Screenwriter - Richard Price
based on the novel by Walter Tevis
Cinematographer - Michael Ballhaus
Editor - Thelma Schoonmaker
Composer - Robbie Robertson
Production designer - Boris Leven
Set designer - Karen O'Hara
Special effects - Curt Smith
Stunts - Rick LeFevour
Costumes - Richard Bruno
Makeup - Monty Westmore
Technical advisor - Michael Sigel

Cast List


James Coburn - Nick Casey
Omar Sharif - The Deacon
Bruce Boxleitner - Billie Joe Robbins
Ronee Blakley - Carolina Red
Jack O'Halloran - Max
Calvin Lockhart - Snow White
Michael Learner - Paulie
Paul Barselou - Cosmo
Cisse Cameron - Sugar
Jeff Temkin - Sportscaster
Willie Mosconi - Sportscaster
Shepherd Sanders - Robin
Jon Ian Jacobs - Baron
Ed Bakey - Skinny
Robert Hughes - Ricco
Rockne Tarkington - Gunner
Shay Duffin - Al
Thomas Castranova - Ernie
Eric Laneuville - Purvis
William M. Vint - Frankie
Lou Butera,Irving Crane,Richie Florence,Allan Hopkins,Peter Margo
Jim Mataya,Steve Mizerak,Jim Rempe, and Michael Sigel