| Overall Grade: |
A |
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| Story: |
A |
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| Acting: |
A+ |
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| Direction: |
A |
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| Visuals: |
A- |
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Brilliant Character Study
by Eric Ryder (movies profile)
Dec 6, 2007
3
of
3 people found this review helpful
After Hollywood badboy icon James Dean, the findings of another Hollywood rebel was on a standstill. It wasn't until the 1960's when three rebels graced the silver screen and like their predecessor from the 1950's, they too became loved and cherished by fans past and present. The three rebels were Warren Beatty, Steve McQueen and Paul Newman.
In 1967, the silverscreen was captivated to watch two very distinguished anti-heroes, one being Clyde Barrow (Beatty) from the movie "Bonnie and Clyde" who can strike at any bank without any care of being caught or even killed. The other being Luke Jackson (Newman) from "Cool Hand Luke" the hero in this movie, a chain gang prisoner who faces his adversaries with pride and goes through all means to escape from prison only to get caught again and to reescape.
Directed to near perfection by Stuart Rosenberg, Newman's facial emotions tells the story through the art form of method acting where the emotions of the actor/s upstage the dialogue. Nominated for four Academy Awards (including one win) "Cool Hand Luke" is also the forth nomination for Newman and rightfully earned as well.
Newman's Luke is a taciturn individual. But with his charm and charisma, we are rightfully manipulated to sympathize with this character. His facial close-ups indicate that this rebel without a cause is really just a person who's greatly misunderstood. Sure he's no saint, but he's still human, at one time or another we've done bad things before and luckily enough, we managed to get away with our misdemeanors scott free. But even though he may put on a smile once in a while, behind that smile lies a sad, misfortunate soul who just wants to be free though he shows it without sheding a tear.
It seems that trouble is not far from Newman's reach. From the early start of the movie we see Newman in a drunken stupor, trying to take out money from parking meters by unscrewing the tops,laughing in the face of the law, getting in trouble wherever he goes. Even as a chain gang member,Newman is still as incorrigible as ever.
You may wonder why are we rooting for Newman's character? He's a criminal for starters, he dosen't give a damn about us or anyone for that matter. He's a loner who laughs and figuratively spits in the face of authority,so I have to ask myself again, why do we like Luke Jackson? It's not because he's dirt poor or was raised in an abused household, it's because he just wants to be the way he is, not letting society push him around. Self-centered yes, but by standing up for himself, he stands as the perfect anti-hero.
During Luke's time in jail, he is unintimidated by any of the prisoners and remains kept apart from the inmates with his cynical humor and his disobeying ways. After getting into fight with top prisoner Dragline (George Kennedy), Luke, beaten, battered and bruised still continues fighting, and with his continual disregard to the prison guards rules, he becomes respected by the other inmates. His respect continues to grow as he dares to eat 50 hard-boiled eggs in one hour as sort of a pass the time activity in prison.
By now his admiration by his inmates have led to more rebellious dares which have been through many escape plans and recapturings. Even Dragline who fought Luke becomes impressed with Luke's strategy to out-smart the prison guards and even his final act was not because of heroism, but by reflexes.
It's hard to imagine the physical punishment Luke endures in this film. Even in his fight with Dragline he takes quite a licking and keeps on ticking. But after all the physical torture, Luke still has enough energy to plan his near-escapes and failures.It shows that he may be beaten but still manages to keep a stiff upper lip.
There's no doubt about it, this movie is one of Paul Newman's best and Luke Jackson is a great character study in the topic of the non-conformist. His many dimensions in his moods are conducting in very affectionate matter. From contempt to courage, exhaustion to anger, Newman makes the charcter Luke Jackson all that more compelling to watch.
In one of the more tender moments, there's a scene where Luke's dying mother (Jo Van Fleet) visits him. Here the intensity dies down and the hero feels a sense of motionless, sadness and regret. Plus it shows that even a miscreant like Luke does have love for his family. And that he fully listens to her when she said that she once had high hopes for him. It also proves against the cliche that all prisoners were from dysfunctional families. Here Luke's mother very much loves her son but can't explain why he turned out the way he did.
Did you know for a fact that there are some religious references indicated here too? Luke has almost a Christ-like approach to his character. When he was beaten up by Dragline, we can see him beaten almost to death, but somehow miraculously gets up like he wasn't harmed and was given new life like in the resurrection. The attempt to eat fifty eggs, he was posed in the same way Christ was during his crucifixion to the cross. Like in the Last Supper. The bottle opener he wears is sort of like the way priests wear their crosses. And when his mother passes away, the reaction is very climactic and we no longer see a hardened criminal, but a sad, lonely tortured soul, sitting in his bed playing a banjo expressing his feeling that there is no God. This whole religious represented scene indicates the sheer briliiance in Newman's performance.
In the tradition to the later movie "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest", "Cool Hand Luke" is a brilliant character study that's backed up believable imagery splendid photography and very entertaining. There's no happy ending here but that makes it all the more believable. |
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