The Hustler

The Hustlerⁱ aka "The Coolest, Hippest Movie Of Them All... Is Back!" is a very uneven aggregation. The scene wherein the born winner temporarily masquerading as a structural loser -- and consequently bothered by the magical jew'sⁱⁱ dim regard and harsh pronouncements -- inquires with his lover ie mother-surogate stands well out, alight and ablaze by all the lights and blazes available. An unspeakable pinnacle on the silver screen. Just so, exactly right, that's it.

This central point given, the rest doth follow -- you know for instance the woman has to die, because of her role. Mothers die. They wither away first, which is why she had to have a habit, and alcoholism is more marketableⁱⁱⁱ. Nevertheless, the execution, the internal linking of these necessary nodes suffers greatly, and in the end creates a nonveresimilous^iv not-quite-abomination that simply fails to live. It doesn't of course help anything that Piper Laurie has no tits and won't display them, as it doesn't help that she's noticed grave whispering worked for Bacall^v and is trying to make it work for her. It dun work for her. Nothing works for her, not really, where the fuck was Liz Taylor the whore, the shrew, the perfect woman for this role is all I wish to know.^vi

The sorest spot of them all is of course the utter untenable ireality of the selfsame magical jew. So he's going to break the hero's arms in "3 or 4 places" through his henchmen. Because that's how "big time pool halls" work, totally, a scaled up cookie cutter version of the two bit "here's your money, boy" backalley, with the unwashed windows on the gent's room looking in. This makes sense to you ? And then, after actually doing the simply undone, the boss changes his mind ? So he eats both downsides, political and financial ? Entirely nonsensical pile of dead ends and loose threads they didn't know what to do with so just knotted them into one thick ribboned piece of nonsense.

There's worse things to do with one's time than watching this film. Then again
there's also better things to do with one's time. Which is ironic, seeing how there's also better things to do with one's time than shooting pool.

1. 1961, by Robert Rossen, with Paul Newman. [↩]
2. Look, the magical jew is a fundamental storytelling device. It's the father without the bite, the grandfather without the senility, Mircea the Bad without the disinterest. "He owns things" ; and "Hey, just when did you adopt me?".

   Quite. [↩]

3. Reality doesn't have this problem, but fiction does. It has to sell itself. [↩]
4. Totally is a fucking word. Review "Three Sermons Preached Upon Severall Publike Occasions by John Gaude (London, 1642), Part 4, page 62, 3rd paragraph. So then.

   Severall. [↩]

5. Bacal ? [↩]
6. Taking a break after Butterfield 8, because idiot males. Sad.

   All the fuckwads who couldn't fuck her right : fuck you. You cost us a workable Hustler, motherfuckers.

   I'm aware they mostly died meanwhile, but that dindu nuttin. The shame -- it lives on. [↩]