I like it, but I don't love it

Rating: 7/10 (29 March 2019)

First of all, I really like Paul Newman, and for that alone i really wanted to be in love with this movie. I have just finished watching this movie for the second time. The first time I watched it I liked it, but I didn't quite get it. Then I watched it again, and once more, something seemed off.
The movie is very, very slow, which is not necessarily a bad thing in a movie, but in this case it is. I get it that this was intentional, to build the characters correctly, and it succeeds in doing that, but after a while of long, drawn-out scenes in which nothing really happens, I started to lose a little bit of patience. However, this is balanced out by the great acting of Paul Newman as the main character Fast Eddie, and everyone surrounding him is great too, especially Jackie Gleason as Minnesota Fats (I wish we could have seen more of him), but I quickly forgot about the acting and caught myself desperate for some of the scenes to end.
All in all, neither the great acting nor the extremely stylish scenes are enough to make this a great movie. If it was more straight to the point, it would have been an almost perfect movie.
Still, a must watch, and I understand why so many people love it. I wish I did.