Cuz I’m a hustler baby. A couple of years ago we showed you a couple of vintage French one-sheets for the great poolroom drama The Hustler, and today we have the film’s excellent Japanese poster. This is one of those films that everyone has heard of, but surprisingly few people have actually seen. For those in the latter group, we can’t recommend it highly enough. The Hustler, with Paul Newman, Jackie Gleason, George C. Scott, and Piper Laurie, opened in Japan today in 1962.
“Fast Eddie, let’s play some pool.” The Hustler is doubtless the best movie about pool ever made. Director Robert Rossen’s dark vision of the underground billiard circuit earned the film nine Academy Award nominations. All four major cast members received nominations for their acting, although George C. Scott renounced his. The showdown between Jackie Gleason as Minnesota Fats, and Paul Newman as Fast Eddie Felson, ranks as one of the most nail-bitingly tense psychological encounters ever filmed. Fast Eddie has been beating Fats’ brains out for an entire night, and he’s feeling pretty good. Come morning it looks like Fats is whipped. He looks like five miles of bad road. He takes a break, washes his hands, gets his hair-do in order. When he puts his jacket on and adjusts his carnation, Fast Eddie starts grinning. It’s over. Fats is going home. But instead Fats looks at his grinning opponent and says, “Fast Eddie, let’s play some pool.” Like the contest hadn’t even started yet. And Fast Eddie’s smile melted away. The Hustler opened in Paris as L'arnaqueur today in 1962.
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1939—Batman Debuts
In Detective Comics #27, DC Comics publishes its second major superhero, Batman, who becomes one of the most popular comic book characters of all time, and then a popular camp television series starring Adam West, and lastly a multi-million dollar movie franchise starring Michael Keaton, then George Clooney, and finally Christian Bale. 1953—Crick and Watson Publish DNA Results
British scientists James D Watson and Francis Crick publish an article detailing their discovery of the existence and structure of deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA, in Nature magazine. Their findings answer one of the oldest and most fundamental questions of biology, that of how living things reproduce themselves. 1967—First Space Program Casualty Occurs
Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov dies in Soyuz 1 when, during re-entry into Earth's atmosphere after more than ten successful orbits, the capsule's main parachute fails to deploy properly, and the backup chute becomes entangled in the first. The capsule's descent is slowed, but it still hits the ground at about 90 mph, at which point it bursts into flames. Komarov is the first human to die during a space mission. 1986—Otto Preminger Dies
Austro–Hungarian film director Otto Preminger, who directed such eternal classics as Laura, Anatomy of a Murder, Carmen Jones, The Man with the Golden Arm, and Stalag 17, and for his efforts earned a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame, dies in New York City, aged 80, from cancer and Alzheimer's disease. 1998—James Earl Ray Dies
The convicted assassin of American civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., petty criminal James Earl Ray, dies in prison of hepatitis aged 70, protesting his innocence as he had for decades. Members of the King family who supported Ray's fight to clear his name believed the U.S. Government had been involved in Dr. King's killing, but with Ray's death such questions became moot.
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