Slideshow
COOL HAND LUKE
Monday, March 27
7:20
Post-film conversation with Melissa Newman, daughter of Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, and film historian Foster Hirsch.
Paul Newman's posthumously published memoir The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man (Knopf) will be available at our concession.
U.S., 1967
Directed by Stuart Rosenberg
Written by Donn Pearce and Frank R. Pierson
Based on the novel of the same name by Donn Pearce
Starring Paul Newman, George Kennedy, Strother Martin
Approx. 126 min. 35mm.
“What we’ve got here is a failure to communicate.” On the chain gang for decapitating parking meters, Paul Newman takes on Top Con George Kennedy (Best Supporting Oscar), enjoys the view as a voluptuous blonde washes her car in full view of the entire gang, bets he can eat 50 hard-boiled eggs, and keeps trying to escape, prompting Captain Strother Martin’s legendary comment, until…
Reviews
“What elevates this brutal picture above the ruck of prison films and into the range of intelligent contemplation of the ironies of life is a sharp script by Donn Pearoe and Frank R. Pierson, ruthlessly realistic and plausible staging and directing by a new man, Stuart Rosenberg, and splendid acting by Paul Newman and a totally unfaultable cast.”
– Bosley Crowther, The New York Times
“A highly humorous and deeply dramatic study of the immolation of human spirit in captivity.”
– John Mahoney, The New York Times