"If you're too old to cut the mustard, you can lick the jar".

Rating: 7/10 (17 October 2009)

It's been a while now since I saw "The Hustler", but my memory suggests that it was substantially more grim and gritty than this much later sequel, if one could even call it that. That might owe to the earlier film's black and white photography adding a noirish feel to the smoke filled pool parlors and lounges where the young Eddie Felson used to ply his trade. With "The Color of Money", I couldn't get quite comfortable with where the picture was going or if we would ever get there. The basic plot is understood, the now older Eddie (Paul Newman) would take upstart newcomer Vincent Lauria (Tom Cruise) under his wing, teach him how to read his opponents, stake him in his matches, and collect his share of the winnings. I never really got the sense though that Vincent was ever really along for that ride, since he almost never took Eddie's advice, allowing his ego to constantly get in the way of their shared goal.
What I got the biggest kick out of had to do with the musical lyrics set to various confrontations Vincent dealt with on the circuit. Eddie's warning about Moselle was comically echoed by Warren Zevon's line - 'You better stay away from him, He'll rip your lungs out Jim' - that was great. Later, as Grady Seasons runs the table, Vincent has to consider - 'Are you gonna fall for this'?
The other noteworthy moment watching the film today had to do with Paul Newman's character talking to Vincent early in the story, and explaining how he would teach him how to hustle. The discussion might have just as well turned on Newman giving pointers to Cruise on how to act at this early point in his career. That's not meant to be a put down, but you can definitely see the difference between the actor Cruise of today compared to two decades earlier. Just an observation.
I suppose my qualms about the picture have to do with it's pacing in the latter half, when the focus is on Fast Eddie's decision to compete again. There's that swimming pool dive that comes from nowhere, and the attendant visit to the optometrist when he realizes his sight is impaired. That just seemed to break the flow of the story enough to give it a disjointed feel. Later, Eddie's victory over Vincent in the tournament seemed tainted, and then of course, that's revealed to be true. I guess I was looking for the picture to end on some kind of message shedding light on the underlying decency of the principal players, but instead it looked like they both wound up behind an eight ball.