The Hustler (Two-Disc Collector's Edition) (DVD)

As far as Paul Newman's younger career goes I am not an expert. I will say of the few of his earlier films I have seen I liked about 50% of them, especially Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Cool Hand Luke and The Sting. Those are some good movies. Now, Fox is re-releasing a couple of his classics in The Hustler and The Verdict, two of his films I had actually not seen. Yeah, I know not seeing The Hustler is considered slightly blasphemous, but it is now under my belt and I am here to chat about it.

First off, I have seen Color of Money on numerous occasions and it is quite possible that my love for that film affected my opinion of this one considering I did not enjoy The Hustler as much as I did Color of Money but I believe I have good reason for my opinion.

The Hustler is a well crafted drama it simply isn't tight enough to be considered great. As the story begins we meet young Eddie Felson (Newman), a pool hustler with his sights set on the pool world's top dog, Minnesota Fats (Jackie Gleason). He's cocky and arrogant and on top of that... he's really good. Felson has convinced himself that if he can take $10,000 off Fats in one night he must be the best out there, and it almost works out. Unfortunately the night ends with him broke and busted and this is where the film loses its edge.

The second act of The Hustler is a slow character build that never really builds much tension or interest on its way to a satisfying third act primarily due to a fantastic performance by George C. Scott as he takes on the role of Felson's manager to get him back on his feet. Mixed in with all this plotline is Eddie's new found love interest Sarah Packard (Piper Laurie), while her performance is fine her character needs some serious fine-tuning. After her introduction she becomes a whiny nuisance and her character never adds anything extra special to the story.

Accompanying this second DVD release of The Hustler you will get a pieced together audio commentary with Paul Newman, Carol Rossen (Robert Rossen's Daughter), Dede Allen (Editor), Stefan Gierasch (Actor), Ulu Grosbard (Assistant Director), Richard Schickel (Film Critic, Time Magazine) and Jeff Young (Film Historian). The commentary is disjointed and annoying and not worth the time.

You also get a group of featurettes that seem to all work together giving you the same story and the only interesting thing I got out of it was that the only reason the film is shot in black and white, despite being filmed in the color era, was that because director Robert Rossen simply wasn't comfortable with color. One of the things I love about Scorsese's Color of Money is the mood he creates in the pool hall atmosphere, it isn't a place we are taken too in movies very often and when we are there it is nice to be welcomed to colors and atmospheric tones we aren't used to.

Other than that both discs include features with pool shot trickster Mike Massey. On disc one you get a pop-up style feature in which he comes on and explains the shots you are seeing in the film and the second disc includes a similar feature, but this time instead of explaining the shots he shows you how they are done. It is pretty cool, but the shots in The Hustler aren't spectacular enough to warrant this feature. However, as Color of Money seems to be a far seedier film it is a feature that would be fantastic with that disc, I would particularly like a commentary track with Massey as he does talk a bit about the life of a hustler in his comments on disc one.

On a whole I think this is a decent special edition, but from what I have read elsewhere it isn't a major upgrade to the first release and you may want to wait on the high definition version if you already own it on DVD. However, if you are without and want to get your hands on a copy of your own, it is going for only $14.99 at Amazon right now, click the Buy Now button above and get your own.