The Sting

*que The Entertainer*

I’ve been meaning to watch The Sting for ages now and what finally got me to watch it was my father starting to watch it in the other room whilst my mother and I played Mario Kart and both of us saying, “Wait! Wait! We’ll all watch it together!”

I’ll say this: The movie is pretty good!

The story follows this lil grifter played by Robert Redford. Redford starts out grifting with the help of Robert Earl Jones, actor, boxer, and father to James Earl Jones.

These two lunkheads accidentally rip off the mob.

The lunkheadier of the two (Redford) blows all his money on one bet, while Earl Jones plans to retire with his share.

Every once in a while I’ll watch a film in which a particularly charismatic performance appears at the beginning of the picture and I’ll say to myself Oh, they’re dead as hell. No way they’ll be in act three.

This was the case with Robert Earl Jones, the mob throws him out of his apartment, (flat if you’re English,) window; killing him.

This angers Redford enough that he swears vengeance on the mob boss what done it. In order to enact his revenge he must recruit, (Can one simply cruit? Why must one always do in again?) the slimiest and wily-eyed person imaginable: Paul Newman.

I am serious. They get Paul Newman, one of the most handsome, put together, nice Jewish boys in Hollywood at the time to play this scoundrel. Mr. “Why go out for hamburgers when you have steak at home,” guy. (This was about infidelity in marriage not about his eating habits.)

To his credit, Newman is very good in the part. Like, incredibly good. Good in a way that actors don’t really do much of anymore. You can’t take your eyes off him. It’s NUTS.

There’s a scene where Newman has to pretend to be drunk and it is perhaps the funniest thing I’ve seen in a movie in years. He fully burps on command. Do you know how rare that is these days? A full burp as well. Not one that you suck in a blow out your nose, a belch, something that you’d be concerned about if you had done it. Truly a master of his craft.

So, basically they trick this mob boss, played by the guy from Jaws, no not Dreyfuss, the other one, no the sea captain. What’s his name? Shaw? Yes, I just had a google, and it’s Robert Shaw.

A brief aside here, one of the aliases they use in the picture is “Mr. Shaw” which my father astutely pointed out must have been confusing as all get-out for everyone.

Also, another brief aside here, Robert Shaw plays an Irish person. Robert Shaw was English. I found this offensive, not just because of the optics, but also because of the accent Shaw’s uses makes the Lucky Charms Leprechaun sound like Brenden Gleeson.

I’ll say though, they do interstitials with Scott Joplin’s The Entertainer playing. You know the one the “Do do do da do da doo, buh da da da da da da buh bum.” That one!

And man, does it make you wish you’d go deaf.

So, they trick this mob guy and it’s pretty neat to see.

The Runtime is 2 hours and 9 minutes (jeez)