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Watched this movie for the first time today after finding it on the iTunes Store for $4.99. I’ve long been a fan of Paul Newman and, as this is one of the rare 100% movies on RT and contains #11 on the AFI’s 100 Years, 100 Movie Quotes List (What we’re dealing with here is failure to communicate.), I felt compelled to finally give it a watch.
To say it was more than worth the five dollars is an understatement. Newman played the title role brilliantly and there were solid supporting roles from George Kennedy as fellow inmate Dragline and Strother Martin as the villain, the Captain.
Its role as one of the earliest anti-establishment films of the Vietnam War era and its subtle use of Christian imagery are quite remarkable and the film certainly holds up after almost six decades. It is especially enjoyable if you’re a fan of other prison dramas such as The Shawshank Redemption as there’s a rather similar tone between the two films.
This one, in my opinion, has certainly earned its 100% RT rating and is well worth the watch. I was quite glad to find it at such a great price and highly recommend this for addition to your film collection if you haven’t already seen it.
“Them clothes got laundry numbers on them. You remember your number and always wear the ones that has your number. Any man forgets his number spends a night in the box. These here spoons you keep with you. Any man loses his spoon spends a night in the box. There's no playing grab-ass or fighting in the building. You got a grudge against another man, you fight him Saturday afternoon. Any man playing grab-ass or fighting in the building spends a night in the box. First bell's at five minutes of eight when you will get in your bunk. Last bell is at eight. Any man not in his bunk at eight spends the night in the box. There is no smoking in the prone position in bed. To smoke you must have both legs over the side of your bunk. Any man caught smoking in the prone position in bed... spends a night in the box. You get two sheets. Every Saturday, you put the clean sheet on the top... the top sheet on the bottom... and the bottom sheet you turn in to the laundry boy. Any man turns in the wrong sheet spends a night in the box. No one'll sit in the bunks with dirty pants on. Any man with dirty pants on sitting on the bunks spends a night in the box. Any man don't bring back his empty pop bottle spends a night in the box. Any man loud talking spends a night in the box. You got questions, you come to me. I'm Carr, the floor walker. I'm responsible for order in here. Any man don't keep order spends a night in...the box. I hope you ain't going to be a hard case.”
"You punch in at 8:30 every morning, except you punch in at 7:30 following a business holiday, unless it's a Monday, then you punch in at 8 o'clock. Punch in late and they dock ya. Incoming articles get a voucher, outgoing articles provide a voucher. Move any article without a voucher and they dock ya. Letter size a green voucher, oversize a yellow voucher, parcel size a maroon voucher. Wrong color voucher and they dock ya! 6787049A/6. That is your employee number. It will not be repeated! Without your employee number you cannot get your paycheck. Inter-office mail is code 37, intra-office mail 37-3, outside mail is 3-37. Code it wrong and they dock ya! This has been your orientation. Is there anything you do not understand, is there anything you understand only partially? If you have not been fully oriented, you must file a complaint with personnel. File a faulty complaint...and they dock ya!" - The Hudsucker Proxy (another Paul Newman film, incidentally)
Carl, the floor walker.
Fixed it. Thanks.
Actually, it’s Carr.
Unfixed it. Thank you!
Watchin the movie, boss
Alright. Watch that movie, Drag.
Typin with 1 hand boss.
You watch that movie there, boy.
I haven't eaten hard-boiled eggs ever since. Every time I see a hard-boiled egg, I can't help but think of this movie.
Nobody can eat 50 eggs.
Comment deleted by user
Could you expound upon the Christ figure comment please. I remember watching this for my freshman literature class in 1985 and having to do a paper on it. For some reason I think I brought up this aspect, but can't remember the specifics. All I can think of is the scene when he's laying prostrate after eating the eggs.
He's layed out on the table sort of in the crucifix position after the egg eating scene. He is betrayed by one of his top friends/disciples at the end. Probably more but those two come to mind.
So the warden is like Pontius Pilate?
No, because Pilate tried to prevent the crucifixion.
I had to write a paper on this movie for a college class too. I distinctly remember him inside the church near the end saying, “What do you got in mind for me? What do I do now?”
Shakin it up boss!!!
Takin it off boss!
“Sometimes nothin’ is a real cool hand”.
Best line in the whole movie, if you ask me.
Roll credits
George Kennedy is so good in this also. And don’t forget the stellar score with the classical guitar!
George Kennedy won Best Supporting Actor for his role. The cast was fantastic top to bottom, though.
The score was brilliant and I certainly made mention of Mr. Kennedy’s performance.
One of the greatest films ever made. Everyone always says Cat on A Hot Tin Roof, or Hud are his best roles but Cool Hand Luke is the absolute tits for me.
Speaking of tits, we should mention the performance of Joy Harmon.
She can wash my car anytime.
Color of Money is my 2nd for him.
Over Hustler!?
Both are great. The last 10 minutes of CoM hit me just as hard as the end of Cool Hand. Just a look he gives of the realization and then the regret. In both.
Butch Cassidy
I think you should also try the Hustler (1961). It's the third Newman film I have seen and as much as I liked Cool Hand Luke, I like this one even better.
Oh yea, I'm a big Newman fan, The Sting, Cool Hand Luke, The Hustler, Color of Money, The Hudsucker Proxy, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid are all in my top 20.
No love for Player/Coach Reg Dunlop?
I love Slap Shot! Damn I'm about to have to go on a Newman binge now.
"She knows exactly what she's doing."
Torturing all of us and loving every minute of it.
I think there was an homage to this scene in The Sandlot during the pool scene 🤣
yes!
lotioning and oiling and oiling and lotioning!
Detail, one of my favorite summertime shirts:
https://i.imgur.com/pZMqAB0.jpg
Where did you ever find a Wendy Pfeffercorn print fabric made into a shirt, and where, for the love of CPR, do I get one?
these guys
https://www.rsvlts.com/pages/ultimate-sandlot?_pos=1&_psq=the+sandlot&_ss=e&_v=1.0
sadly, i don't think they sell em anymore
maybe u email their customer service to see if any are laying around?
On those rare occasions when I have to hand-wash my car, I can't but help to remember Cool Hand Luke.
“What we got here is failure to communicate. Some men you just can’t reach which is what we got right here. Well he wants it, he gets it! I don’t like it any more than you men”
Great movie, here this quote at the intro to Guns N Roses song “Civil War” It was a great scene in the movie
Cool Hand Luke... a natural-born world-shaker with the most endearing grin. One of my all time favorite films.
This is one of my favorite movies of all time. It has a story arc but is probably one of the best examples of character study in film. Whenever I want to start a fight at a party, I make the statement that COOL HAND LUKE is by far the better film than SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION. It never fails to elicit passionate responses. Both movies are about hope but CHL is a grittier hope.
It uses a lot of Christian symbolism, yes. Lucas Jackson is a war hero that leaves the military at the same rank he went in. Eating the eggs, digging the hole, the crossroads super imposed with his photo, there is much much more. But I wouldn’t call it a Christian movie. It subverts a dominant popular Christian narrative — the happy ending — which is one of the things that makes it a better movie than Shawshank.
One of the other things that makes it a better movie than Shawshank is that it doesn’t need voiceover narration to tell the story. Nobody seems to mind Morgan Freeman’s voiceover narration because we all love Easy Reader. But come on! It’s lazy.
CHL on the other hand, uses character reactions, dialogue, and cinematography to do what the narration in Shawshank does. Every time you hear the Luke theme music start, it signals that you just learned something new about Luke. At the end of the fight with Dragline, watch the reaction of guards to the fight. A voiceover could have narrated that but they pull the camera back as the music comes up and you see them all unnerved by what they just witnessed. And it’s a totally different reaction than what you see from the other prisoners during the fight.
The dialogue does a lot of work in CHL. But what is interesting is that it doesn’t (except in very oblique ways) fill in backstory or provide narration. The quotations in Cool Hand Luke derive from character. Luke talking to his mother doesn’t fill in much backstory. It’s frustrating and I love it. It shows the complexity of a mother child relationship by showing the difficulty of talking about feeling and yet it says so much!
There are a number of popular quotations from Shawshank that are quotations of the narrative. They are beautiful. But they are Red telling us what to think and have the feel of narrative voice that has stepped outside the story and is looking back in. In CHL, though, the remembered quotations are part of the action and completely reflect the character who delivers them. You aren’t told how to feel about the character. You feel it and you see other characters feel it.
I could go on and on about this movie. It is a masterclass in story and character. Understand that I do like Shawshank. It’s a nice story. But Cool Hand Luke is so spartan in plot, backstory, and setting and yet manages to create a very rich an emotionally complex story.
BTW, if you were at Emporia State University in Kansas in the 90’s and were forced to watch Cool Hand Luke in your composition classes, you can blame that on me.
It definitely isn't. It questions the hypocrisy of christianity. The evil oppressors are clearly "god fearing folk", "doing god's work".
My favourite character of this type is Nurse Ratched [in the film not the series which I turned off after 10 mins] The outcome of her actions are pure evil, yet her intentions are as pure as the driven snow. And reinforced by the entire community in which she practices. Scary.
Great analysis. I love Shawshank but CHL is top 5 all time for me.
I enjoyed the book too maybe because I love the movie. The writer actually served on chain gangs which lends some authenticity to the story that comes through
And apparently played one of the prisoners in the movie!
Come on, safety pin!
Yeah…that scene certainly had my attention, I’ll admit. When one of the inmates said “She don’t even know what she’s doing!”, before Luke even said it, the next line was already out of my mouth.
“Oh, she knows exactly what she’s doing.”
The first time I watched this was with my ex who was fascinated by Newman, but hadn't seen many (any) of his movies and had a hard time sitting through movies period. So we watched it in two parts over a couple of weeks. Even with the suboptimal viewing experience, I was convinced I didn't like it. Told my dad (huge Newman fan), and he insisted I give it another shot.
Even after the second viewing, I was lukewarm (no pun intended). Still, I kept thinking about it in the days after, so I'd go pop it back in to rewatch a scene or two. And the more I thought about it and the more I rewatched it, the magic took hold. It's not only fantastic, it's singular and I think that's what has given it such incredible staying power. And probably why it took so long to "get it". To use a sports allusion, Newman, Kennedy and Martin are an incomparable Big 3. That kind of acting talent between only three people in one movie is ridiculous.
Martin, in particular, stood out to me. I remember him from exactly one other film: McLintock!, a John Wayne Western that came out four years prior. Martin played Agard, a government official watching over some Native Americans, and I don’t think any other character I’ve seen in film history was a further cry from the Captain than Agard. Where the Captain was a mean bastard, Agard was a wimp and a pushover.
While I mention it, anyone who hasn’t should check out McLintock!. It’s a fun movie and one of my favorite Westerns.
I was shown Butch Cassidy pretty young and I would quote Martin's character incessantly. "Morons...I've got morons on my team." Huge, huge fan of his. Fantastic voice.
Martin was pretty good atmosphere in a couple of Sam Peckinpah movies: THE WILD BUNCH and THE BALLAD OF CABLE HOGUE.
Great. Also, check out The Hustler. At least equally as good. The Cincinnati Kid, with Steve McQueen, is definitely worth a look. All the movies are classics which I have watched numerous times.
All time fave. My dad told me it was his fave when I was in HS 20yrs ago and it became mine too, helped me get some perspective on him.
Fun fact: lens flare was an issue for cameras that had to be painstakingly worked around in early film, famously Orson Wells I think first found a way to avoid it in Citizen Kane. Cool Hand Luke was the first major movie to use it as a stylistic choice. Saw this on YT so I may not be 100% on the specifics.
So the only downside to CHL is Michael Bay I guess?
Sweatiest movie ever. Lot of big existential questions asked, but I remember Lucille the most.
I’m sure that scene was to a lot of boys in the 60s and 70s what Phoebe Cates in that red bikini was for a lot of us in the 80s and 90s.
Is her name confirmed to be Lucille, or is that just Dragline's homoerotic nickname?
Just a nickname. In the film, she’s only credited as The Girl.
I knew she was credited as 'The Girl' but I also knew she was referred to as 'Lucille'.
I think in my innocent youth I misinterpreted Dragline saying "she knows what she's doing" as him saying he knew her, and the memory stuck. I mean that's not the kind of memory a young boy gives up easy.
"Takin em off here boss"
It’s on Max but it leaves on 5/31 fyi, reader
It’s $5 on the iTunes Store until at least Tuesday. As good a time as any to pick it up for a bargain.
The movie is similar to "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest". The main character is smarter than everyone else, but maybe too clever by half.
what we have here is failure to communicate.
All-timer
^ I am a fan
Also one of the great soundtracks of all time. Schifrin perfectly nails the mood and themes of the film.
Only watched it for the first time the other week, fantastic movie with fantastic performances…
I don't care if it rains or freezes....
No man can eat 50 eggs
Always loved the theme song in this one. Fits Luke like an old glove.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPT37lHsvSY
“I wish you’d stop being so good to me, captain.”
George Kennedy and Luke Askew absolutely stole the movie IMO
Now I hear Guns'n'Roses' Civil War in my head
Perfectly understandable. That’s where I first heard the line, too.
What we’ve got here is failure to communicate. Some men you just can’t reach. So you get what we had here last week, which is the way he wants it; well, he gets it.
George Kennedy what a great and underrated actor. Also sitting on the bed with dirty pants. One night in the box.
All I do is move rocks and eat eggs
This movie actually stopped me eating eggs, which was a worry to my mum because they were basically my entire diet as a kid
Read the book. You'll like it
https://youtu.be/dG9tuuznL1Y
Sang this song during a road-trip with a now ex girlfriend. She thought I was crazy. She never saw the movie.
That tear, man.
Hell yeah, this and The Sting top 5 all time movies for me personally. Showed this movie to a friend about ten years ago when we were in our druggy phase. This guy couldn’t pay attention to shit and I was sure he would hate it. But instead he watched it with fascinated attention all the way through, and quoted it for months. Amazing movie that might take a minute for some but it will absolutely capture you
Strother Martin was great in this and Butch Cassidy.
Been my favorite character driven movie since I saw it when I was around 12. It has inspired much of my life for both good and bad. I just relate to the character so much and Paul Newman inhabited the role so completely that it changed my viewpoint on a great many things.
It's one of the timeless classics that will never fade. I remember watching this and 'Papillon' for the first time, one Christmas, and they both blew me away. I think Towering Inferno was on the same year, just to compound my confusion.
Anyway 'Papillon' is another great film, but still a distance behind CHL.
You got a cool hand
What we have here is a failure to communicate.
Babalooah....got a bet here!
I liked that it had Ed from The Naked Gun.
Can anyone answer this for me? When Luke escaped the 2nd time, and sent the boys the magazine with his photo. Was that a real photo? Or a fake? Was he really doing all that during his time outside? Sorry if this question is dumb. Thanks
Thought this was a behind the scenes of Luke's robot hand 😂
Anyone who calls the Christian imagery in this movie ‘subtle’ is a moron. I mean no disrespect.