Are you even kidding me? This is the Best Picture of 1961? As an FYI. this is the same group that brought you Gigi, so I'm thinking payments were made.
In case you didn't know, West Side Story is Romeo and Juliet, but they've added singing, dancing and street gangs. Sound like an unlikely combination? That's because it is. It does not hold up to time at all well. Dancing street gangs? Tell me, when was the last time you saw the Crips dancing up the street? By the way, if anybody can prove to me there were street gangs with names like the Jets and the Sharks in 1961, maybe I'll take this whole attempt to deal with youth violence a little more seriously. Then I will call those gangs punks. The music isn't even all that great and my evidence for this is that with my tin ear, I thought it sucked. I'm not even sure all the actors could actually sing. Here's one who could, Rita Moreno, who won an Oscar for this and with one of the most famous songs of West Side Story, "In America."
Now this may seem to be nitpicking to you all, but I believe Puerto Rico is actually in America. Anyone? The only part of this film that livened my interest was when the Jets attacked Rita Moreno and I thought maybe Chris Keller from Oz would come kill them all.
See? That would have been fun. I wouldn't even have cared if he had sung and danced afterward.
Okay, let's go ahead and look at the nominees that year. Fanny, The Guns of Navarone, Judgment at Nuremberg, which I have previously covered: and The Hustler.
The Hustler starring Paul Newman, Piper Laurie, George C. Scott and Jackie Gleason. Paul Newman is "Fast Eddie" Felson, a pool shark who wants to prove he's the best in the world by beating the legendary "Minnesota" Fats played by Jackie Gleason. He loses badly because of his own hubris and falls in with Sarah played by Piper Laurie, who is some sort of boozing college student with writing aspirations and a limp. I'm not sure why I felt the need to add that, I'm still trying to figure out why the filmmakers added it, she's damaged or something? I don't know. Anyway, Eddie tries to hustle someone and gets his thumbs broken which is bad for a pool player. He heals and gets a new stakeholder, Bert, played by George C. Scott. Bert tells Eddie that the reason he lost to Minnesota was that he had talent, but no character. He's right, which in my mind always make a truly great villain. This is Eddie losing to Minnesota Fats.
Meanwhile, Sarah becomes more concerned about Eddie's drive for success even as she accompanies him to Kentucky where Bert has arranged a game for him. The game turns out to be billiards not pool and Eddie loses. Sarah pleads with him to leave, but he won't because he's driven by his desire to win. Sarah calls his world "twisted, perverted and crippled" and leaves. Eddie comes back and wins, but Bert goes back to the hotel first and sexually assaults Sarah, which we never actually see. She kills herself and Eddie comes back to the hotel to find she's scrawled those same words "twisted, perverted and crippled" on the bathroom mirror.
Eddie goes back to New York to challenge Minnesota Fats. He bets all of his winnings and beats him so badly he has to quit. Bert demands his share and Eddie reminds him about Sarah. Bert relents, but tells Eddie he can never play pool again. It's Sarah's death that finally enables Eddie to see there's more to life than winning and that's how he can finally win. It's only by letting go that he can succeed. I know that must seem convoluted, but that's what actually happens. It's like a whole Oprah "Aha!" moment type of thing.
The cinematography is beautiful, it's black and white, but still so sharp. Paul Newman is as usual, brilliant. Newman was from the first generation of Actors' Studio students and it shows. He had a way of just inhabiting his characters, no matter what he was called upon to do. George C. Scott does menace exceptionally well and conveys it even as he tries to play the mentor figure. Jackie Gleason is great in an unexpected sober performance, where he does so little and much like Newman seems to inhabit his character. Now the stats: Gleason, Scott, Laurie: Oscar nominations. The director, Robert Rossen, got nominated but lost to those jerks from West Side Story. Paul Newman got nominated for Best Actor, but lost to Maximilian Schell. Paul Newman actually finally won a Best Actor Oscar for playing this same role opposite Tom Cruise in The Color of Money, which I used to think was the worst film ever made, but is now just the worst film ever made by Martin Scorsese. Don't believe me?
I'm just like, why? Why did we do that? Still, Paul Newman could kick Tom Cruise's ass any day of the week and make a better salad dressing. So, conclusion about 1961? The movie with Paul Newman in it got robbed. Again.
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