Tag Archives: pool

Steptoe and Son – “Pot Black”

Pot BlackWhen asked, “What is your favorite billiards movie or TV episode?,” most the writers, actors and directors I have interviewed respond, understandably, by saying The Hustler or The Color of Money. (I would reply the same way.) But, Oliver Crocker, director of the forthcoming snooker film, Extended Rest, surprised me with his answer: “Pot Black,” the Season 6, December, 1970 episode of the British sitcom Steptoe and Son.

At the risk of Anglican dismay, I admit in full transparency that I had never heard of the series, which was broadcast by the BBC from 1962 to 1965, and again from 1970 to 1974. Steptoe and Son focused on the inter-generational conflicts of a father (Wilfrid Brambell) and son (Harry H. Corbett) who run a rag-and-bone (i.e., junk collection) business on Oil Drum Lane, a fictional street in Shepherd’s Bush, London.   The series was remade in the US as Sanford and Son.[1]

Like many Steptoe and Son episodes, “Pot Black” featured only the father Albert and the son Harold. The full episode is available to watch here.

“Pot Black” begins with Harold’s one-sided decision to bring an old snooker table into the house so that he can rediscover his skills for the game. Albert, characteristically grumpy, believes there is no room for the table in the house, but he is overruled by his son in one of their umpteenth disagreements, who is convinced the table will fit. Moreover, Harold conceives that having a snooker table in the house will finally enable him to beat his father in a game, as history has repeatedly sided with his father, who effortlessly and routinely trounces him in games whenever they compete.

Pot BlackThe table, of course, does not fit, albeit the bull-headed Harold refuses to admit it. A comedic sequence ensues with Harold challenging his father to a match and overruling his protestations. But, the game does not go well. Butting up against walls, and forced to take shots leaning in through windows, Harold continues to miscue, potting the cue ball on every shot. (Fans of Seinfeld will recall a similar claustrophobic pool table shtick with Kramer and Frank Costanza at the end of “The Doll” episode.) Eventually, Harold snaps a cue stick in rage, conceding that his game is hamstrung by the lack of space, and then insisting that they continue their match by bringing the snooker table outside.

Pot BlackAs the hours go by, both players struggle to make shots and the score remains about even. Albert’s insistence that he will catch pneumonia and his subsequent plea to end the game at 3AM is overruled. Similarly, a lightning storm, which frightens the father and drenches the table, fails to stop the game, though ample squeegeeing is now required in between shots.

Finally, after a seeming eternity, Harold squeaks out a win. After doing a brief victory jig and proclaiming he has a “natural aptitude for the game,” Harold condescendingly offers to give his father “a few lessons tomorrow and show him exactly where he went wrong.” Albert congratulates his son and humbly acknowledges his own inferiority.

[SPOILER ALERT] But when his son walks off, Albert returns to the table, grimacing, and proceeds to make a series of incredible trick shots, revealing to the audience the snooker skills he intentionally did not share with his son, thereby having the last laugh.

The “Pot Black” episode took its name from the BBC televised series Pot Black, which featured annual snooker tournaments held across the United Kingdom from 1969 to 1986. The series transformed snooker from a minority sport played by a few professionals into one of the most popular sports in the United Kingdom. In fact, an interesting linkage between the Pot Black series and the “Pot Black” episode is Sydney Lee, a snooker player from the 1950s, who was both the technical advisor on the snooker sequences in “Pot Black” and a popular referee on the Pot Black series.

[1]       In fact, Sanford and Son had a 1973 billiards episode, “A House is Not a Poolroom,” which loosely borrowed from the Steptoe and Son – “Pot Black” episode in that the residence does not have room for a new billiards table.

Ten-Twenty

It is difficult today to conceive the challenge billiards evangelist and promoter Frank Oliva, and his partner, sportscaster “Whispering” Joe Wilson, faced in launching the billiards game-show Ten-Twenty in 1959.

Ten-TwentyBilliards columnist George Fels captured the time period well: “There was no The Hustler except in fiction form, where it barely created a ripple. There was no Johnson City or its hustlers’ jamborees, therefore no “Minnesota Fats” in the national eye, nor his fabled rivalry with all-time champion Willie Mosconi. In other words, the two men had absolutely no momentum of any kind going for them to support the pitching of their idea.”[1]

Fortunately, Oliva was a hustler – not the pejorative version that has become the archetype of billiards players in movies, but the unwavering type, who would pursue a goal with bottomless passion and courageous conviction.

In describing his mentor and teacher in an AZ Billiards Forum message thread years ago, Scott Lee (of Pool Knowledge) said, “Frank [Oliva] was an innovator, a master teacher…and an all-around good guy, who loved pool…All he ever wanted was to help pool players find a way to make legitimate money at pool, without having to resort to gambling.”

Oliva recognized that for billiards to achieve public popularity, it must expand beyond the pool parlor scene to the television screen. Bowling provided a great analog and forerunner. In the late 1950s, ten-pin bowling went mainstream, entering millions of homes on Friday nights, thanks to hugely popular televised shows like Jackpot Bowling.

Ten-TwentyThe key was how to translate billiards to the television medium. In 1958, Oliva created a new game, Ten-Twenty, that was a variation of classic 14-1 straight pool. Each match consisted of eight innings of play. Each player could score up to 10 points each per inning. In the eighth inning, if a player scored 10 points, he could continue shooting for an extra 20 points. A perfect match score would be 100 points. Fouls would cost 1 point each. The matches were timed and if it ended before the eighth inning, the scores would be taken from the last fully completed inning. The full rules are available here. Oliva’s brilliance was acknowledging the need for time constraints, and then introducing the concept of timed play to professional pool in a way that could substantially, yet fairly, impact the outcome.

But, creating the game was only the first of many challenges. To pitch it to a broadcasting network, Oliva had to prove there was sufficient interest and financial support. Oliva successfully wrangled 82 different billiards parlors from the Chicago area to pitch in. (Many years later, Oliva elaborated, “Brunswick was main sponsor of the show, along with several distributors, manufacturers, and billiards rooms…Some that I remember were Hanson Billiard Mfg, Sydney Laner Co, and National Billiards…we probably had more sponsors than any show since.”[2])

Finally, there was the issue of player support. Unlike future US billiards game shows (i.e. Ballbreakers), Ten-Twenty was not designed for amateurs; it was intended to attract the top players of the era. The lure of playing on television of course helped, but so did the financial rewards. The best players could win more than $1000 ($8,160 inflated in today’s real dollars), or even $5000 for a perfect game.   And, since “each week’s winner would return the following week to do battle with a new qualifying top contender, seldom did anyone hold the championship beyond two weeks.”[3]

Ten-Twenty

Frank Oliva

This model would prove successful in attracting a who’s-who among billiards greats. Some of the players that appeared on the show included Joe Procita, Joe Diehl, Don Tozer, Charlie Cacciapaglia, Mike Eufemia, Cisero Murphy, Nick Oliva, “Little” Joey Canton, Jimmy Caras, Willis Covington, “Cowboy” Jimmy Moore, and Irving “The Deacon” Crane.

Armed with a masterful game design, a battalion of sponsors, and a commitment from many of the country’s leading pool-players, Oliva was able to convince WBKB, an ABC affiliate in Chicago, to air Ten-Twenty, starting in 1959. The 30-minute show ran was picked up in many cities, though it never achieved national syndication. Oliva played the role of show producer, referee and player recruiter. His partner, “Whispering” Joe Wilson, who was the Howard Cosell of sports-casting in the 1950s and 1960s, provided the sotto voce play-by-play.

Most of the Ten-Twenty episodes are no longer available (and sadly may no longer exist), but fortunately the entire match between “Cowboy” Jimmy Moore and Irving “The Deacon” Crane is available on YouTube split across five separate clips. You can watch them here.

For those not up on their billiards history, Moore and Crane were two of the world’s best. Moore, a straight-pool master, who was inducted into the Billiard Congress of America’s Hall of Fame in 1994, won the United States National Pocket Billiards Championship in 1958. (He was also a technical advisor on billiards-related scenes in television and film, including My Living Doll and The Family Jewels.) Crane, another straight-pool master, won numerous championships, including six World Crown billiards titles in his career. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1978.

Ten-TwentyThis particular episode not only showcased their incredible skill (a jubilant Wilson remarks at one point, “[That was] one of the greatest shots I’ve ever seen.”), buy also showed how even the greatest can make simple mistakes (check out the rare miss by Crane in Part 4 at 2:33). It also serves as an interesting time capsule, with its public service announcement from top leading man Jeff Chandler about mental illness, which he describes as “America’s number one health problem,” as well as its advertisement for ABC’s new show about the supernatural, Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond.

Sadly, Ten-Twenty was short-lived, lasting maybe 13 weeks in total.[4] There are scant details available about why the show did not experience the same trajectory of success that occurred in bowling game shows like Jackpot Bowling and Make That Spare.  It would require two more years before billiards truly burst into the public imagination with the release of The Hustler in 1961.

Nor was our real hustler, Frank Oliva, deterred for long. His passion for billiards led him to found and organize in the Oliva Women’s Pool League, the country’s most enduring, women’s billiard league. And, his determination to get billiards its deserved national audience also led him back to television in 1967, when he partnered once again with Wilson to launch the game show Minnesota Fats Hustles the Pros.

[1]       “November: Pool, Meet TV,” George Fels, Billiards Digest, November 2011.

[2]       “Frank Oliva,” Pool & Billiards Magazine, November 1986

[3]       “A tribute to the King of televised championship billiards in America,” by Jim Parker.

[4]       There is some confusion about how long the show ran. Various sources I checked said it lasted 8 episodes, 13 weeks, or 2 years.

Fairy Tail – “Moulin Rouge”

Exploding eight balls. Multi-ball trick shots. Cats pitching cue balls. Girl-on-girl pool brawls. A young woman shooting billiards in a revealing bunny outfit. Yep, figured by now I had your attention.

Fairy TailWelcome to the imagination of Hiro Mashima, the creator and illustrator of Fairy Tail, a Japanese manga series that was subsequently adapted into an anime series beginning in 2009. The billiards snippets referenced above are from the episode “Moulin Rouge” (“Mūran Rūju”), released on October 11, 2014, toward the end of the series’ fifth season. The full episode is available to watch here.

Both in its original manga (Japanese comic book) and subsequent anime (Japanese animated art form) format, Fairy Tail is aimed at the shōnen demographic, which is a broad male audience, though the target age range is probably 12-18 years old. As such, the anime features strong male characters, attractive young women with gravity-defying proportions, tight-knit teams, and plenty of high-action battle sequences.

Fairy Tail follows the adventures of the excessively curvaceous 17-year-old wizard, Lucy Heartfilia,[1] after she joins the Fairy Tail wizards’ guild and partners with Natsu Dragneel, who is searching for his missing foster father. Over time, the team expands to many wizards, including Erza Scarlet, an equally sexy, buxom wizard who is widely considered to be the most powerful female member of the guild.

The “Moulin Rouge” episode begins with two of the Fairy Tail Guild wizards, Gray Fullbuster and Juvia Lockser, returning from a job with a new pool table, courtesy of an appreciative client. Gray, showing off not only his chiseled physique but also his otherworldly pool prowess, proceeds to make a series of incredible shots, wowing his fellow wizards and causing Juvia to ask aloud whether he will “poke [her] with his cue stick next.”

Fairy TailNatsu, less familiar with the subtleties of pool, also picks up a cue stick, but confusing the game with baseball, starts smacking pool balls around the hall, causing considerable havoc and wizardly mischief. The hullabaloo wakes reigning ass-kicker and S-class swordsman Erza Scarlet, who recounts the tale of her first introduction to billiards.

The episode then flashes back to Erza some time ago walking into a pool hall. The hall’s gaggle of male patrons, unaware that Erza is a wizard, jape that pool may be “difficult for a woman.” Confronted with such derision, Erza makes a questionable costume change (though not questionable to the series’ pubescent viewers) into a revealing bunny costume that even Hugh Hefner might endorse. Then, picking up the cue stick and channeling her wizardly pool-playing power, she – literally – breaks the pool balls.

Fairy TailThe pool hall schlubs, unsure whether to ogle in her presence or duck for cover, start screaming willy-nilly only when they glance her Fairy Tail guild tattoo. Coincidentally, there is another female wizard that has been recently claiming membership to the guild and stealing from the local proprietors.

Outraged by the notion of a bandit masquerading as a guild member, Erza opts to shed the bunny for a hot waitress outfit and goes next door to the sweets shop to confront the green-haired, scantily-clad, uber-bodacious impersonator known as Mulan Rouge.[2] Unfazed by Erza’s cease-and-desist threats, Mulan naturally fights back by stealing Mulan’s panties (?!) and leaving the scene. Additional fighting ensues, including Erza punching Mulans’ head through the pool hall wall and deflecting Mulan’s bullets with her sword, while simultaneously pocketing billiards balls. Ultimately, Erza extracts a confession from Mulan that her real name is Bisca Mulan, a destitute immigrant who feigns a Fairy Tale guild affiliation in order to make ends meet and feed her sick friend (and mouse) Sonny, which hides in her cleavage.

Fairy TailFortunately, Erza takes pity on Mulan and extends an invitation for her to join the Fairy Tail guild if she’ll renounce her lawless ways. That’s when the flashback ends and we see Bisca, now with long green hair and perhaps even skimpier outfits, reunited with Erza and reminiscing about their first encounter, which leads to them once more playing pool.

As the popularity of anime increases, it will be interesting to see how it intersects with billiards. Until recently, the only “game” in town was Death Billiards, a 26-minute psycho-fantastic film from Madhouse Studios that released in March 2013. Then, one week after A-1 Pictures and Satelight aired the “Moulin Rouge” episode of Fairy Tail, A-1 Pictures aired a billiards episode of Magic Kaito 1412 entitled “Hustler vs Magician.” And on Halloween this year, Madhouse Studios set the Twitterverse aflame with the announcement that Death Billiards would become the basis for a new televised anime series called Death Parade in 2015.

[1]       Lucy’s presumed measurements are a 37-inch bust, 23-inch waist, and 36-inch hips. In comparison, Barbie’s measurements are probably a 36-inch bust, 18-inch waist, and 33-inch hips.

[2]      Mulan Rouge is not only a variation of the Baz Luhrmann Moulin Rouge musical with Nicole Kidman, but also the spiritual birthplace of the modern form of the can-can, a seductive dance originally introduced by courtesans.

 

Ride the 9 (in production)

After experiencing a significant dry spell, billiards movies and television series are poised to make a resounding comeback, starting in 2015. Just last week, the Twitterverse lit up like a glowstick with the announcement that the anime short film Death Billiards would be released in 2015 as a TV anime series entitled Death Parade. David Barroso has been working feverishly to bring his billiards crime drama 8-Ball to the film festival circuit in 2015. Documentarian Angel Levine is aiming to bring her seven-year film opus, Raising the Hustler, to Sundance in 2015. And, across the ocean, director Oliver Crocker is hoping his new snooker film, Extended Rest, will hit screens in 2015.

Best of all, for billiards cinephiles, it might be an extended honeymoon. In 2016, pool movie-lovers should brace themselves for the fingers-crossed release of Ride the 9, a hardcore billiards film from director/producer Blake West and actor/executive producer Jordan Marder. Many may remember first hearing about Ride the 9 back in 2011, when the film’s two-minute teaser, complete with killer soundtrack, gritty New Orleans set locations, and jaw-dropping trick shots courtesy of Florian “Venom” Kohler, first made the YouTube rounds.

Billiards fans were salivating everywhere, posting comments that were some variation of the following: “OMG, I would watch this in a heartbeat.” For the next two years, aficionados regularly monitored the film’s preproduction. But, starting July 2013, the film’s principals became relatively radio-silent, and it looked like Ride the 9 could become “the great film that never was.”

Ride the 9Well, thank the pool gods, Mr. West and Mr. Marder are back, with a passion, commitment, improved story, and better financing to help Ride the 9 crash-land onto the silver screen. I had the pleasure of interviewing Mr. West and Mr. Marder a few weeks ago, and am now 10 times more jazzed for the film’s eventual release.

For starters, these guys – especially Mr. Marder – have pool in the blood. Proving the suggestive power of the medium of film, Mr. Marder was first introduced to pool around the age of 14 by watching The Color of Money and The Hustler, which then led him to spend the next decade lurking in Bronx pool halls, where he “challenged every guy in 9-ball…and lost constantly.” Eventually, he got “sucked into pool” and experienced enough “sketchy situations” to have the resolve not to make Ride the 9 about the underbelly of billiards, but rather about the sport’s heroics.

According to Mr. West, the exact origin for Ride the 9 was a pool game five years ago in New Orleans at Le Bon Temps Roule. (Author’s Note: this is the same Magazine Street watering hole where I honed my pool game for many years. Thumbs up.) “I had just safetied Jordan, when he did an incredible masse shot to sink the 8 ball. Seeing he was such a good player, we decided we needed to do a pool movie,” explained Mr. West.

The basic story of Ride the 9 is that Ethan (Jordan Marder), a pool hustling prodigy who mysteriously disappeared a decade ago, suddenly shows up in New Orleans seeking redemption, only to find an insidious sociopath hell bent on revenge. The title refers to the lingo used in 9-ball when a player goes for the high-risk, high-reward shot of caroming a ball into the 9-ball for a win, rather than trying to run the balls in low-to-high sequential order. Thus, “riding the nine” can be associated with desperation. Or, as Mr. Marder explains, “Riding the nine is about taking chances…learning to go for it without being reckless. That’s the lesson of the film.”

Ride the 9But, the reason behind my titillation is less the story, and more the intersection of three core elements at the heart of great billiards movies: the billiards-playing, the locale, and the music.

Mr. Marder assured me that audiences will see as much pool-playing in Ride the 9 as they saw in The Color of Money. (In other words, a helluva lot pool!) Though the film is “not about pool, pool is integral to the story…it’s the glue.” That’s one of the reasons he reached out early to Florian Kohler. The innovative trick shot legend was happy to help by doubling as Ethan for some key shots. Though Mr. Kohler won’t have a big role in the film, he will be involved in the final tournament sequence, and hopefully will serve as a technical advisor, as well. Other pool players will also make cameos, though none are yet booked, as the film will be “a nod to people who know pool,” according to Mr. West. Added Mr. Marder, “I don’t want any pool player to say that’s not right. We want real authenticity.”

As the idea for the film was birthed in New Orleans, Mr. Marder and Mr. West have decided to film the rest of the movie in the Crescent City, too (and even have named one of their characters Big Easy). This makes it only the second billiards movie in the last 35 years, behind The Baltimore Bullet, a terribly made billiards movie with a high profile cast, to use New Orleans as a primary venue. According to Mr. West, the “story was born there. New Orleans has the gritty feeling we’re going for. Its soul is from New Orleans.” (Ironically, though, the bulk of the pool sequences were shot at Buffalo Billiards in Metairie, the suburban, antiseptic neighbor to New Orleans.)

Ride the 9And then there is the music. Mr. Marder has said that using great music is critical for the movie. If the use of “Young Men Dead” by the Black Angels, a psychedelic rock band from Austin, in the teaser is any indication, then we should expect a film propelled by an explosive soundtrack.

Still, 2016 is a long way away, and the duo are candid that while they have generated some significant equity to produce a film with a $1-2million budget, and not some “super indy film,” there are still a lot of things that have to go right. As Mr. Marder shared, “our dream scenario is to be in pre-production in early 2015, shooting late spring and early summer, then the joy of post-production, [in order for the]movie to be distributed in mid-2016.”

That’s our dream as well.

To stay engaged in the progress of Ride the 9, you can go to the film’s website or follow Jordan Marder (@jordansmarder) and Blake West (@blakewest) on Twitter.

Top 10 Billiards Brawls

What is it about a pool hall that seems to instigate unbridled paroxysms of rage, extended periods of bedlam, and brutal bouts of barbarity, at least in the imaginations of filmmakers, screenwriters and producers?

Billiards Brawls

Scene from Gangster High (2006)

In their defense, the linkage is not totally unfounded. In a five-year study done by the Research Institute on Addictions at the State University of New York at Buffalo, the researchers found that “bar characteristics that are related to the occurrence of violence included: smokiness, noise, temperature, dirt, darkness, crowding, poor ventilation, the presence of competitive games (e.g., darts, pool), bouncers, and more male than female employees.”[1] On the other hand, a more recent study from 2012 revealed that among the “hot spots” for barroom aggression, the pool-playing area accounted for just 4% of the incidents of violence, as opposed to on or near the dance floor (31%), at the bar (16%), or at tables (13%).[2]

Yes, there’s a scintilla of veracity underlying the pool hall free-for-all, but it’s hardly significant enough to warrant all the attention it generates on the silver screen. Nonetheless, movies abound with pool hall pandemonium. Perhaps, it’s the butcherly utility embodied in a cue stick, 59 inches of tapered wood, that can be used to whack, jab, puncture, impale, skewer, bonk or bludgeon. Or, maybe it’s the spherical perfection of a billiards ball, hardened with a phenolic resin, that invite the amateur pugilist to wield it for all sorts of sanguinary purposes.

In any event, if there’s a pool table in a movie (especially one that is otherwise not about billiards), it’s likely going to be ground zero for some kind of mayhem and melee. Thus, I present the TOP 10 BILLIARDS BRAWLS of all time. Let the countdown begin:

10. Out for Justice.   In this 1991 thriller, Steven Seagal plays a Brooklyn cop hell-bent on revenge after his best friend is murdered. Part of tracking down the killer involves frequenting a pool hall where the local patrons are not forthcoming with essential information.   This prompts Seagal to unleash the whup-ass, starting with a towel-wrapped cue ball, followed by some (cue) stick fighting and a pool table judo takedown.

9. Velvet Smooth. The blaxploitation era of the 1970s produced many landmark films and iconic characters, including Superfly, Coffy, and Shaft. But, Velvet Smooth (played by Johnnie Hill) would not even crack the top 100. This 1976 low-budget dud has some of the worst choreographed fighting to appear in Technicolor. And while the billiards scene is so (unintentionally) bad, it earns a place on my list as one of the few movies to feature a woman meting out a cue stick drubbing.

8. Ninja Holocaust. This little-known, questionably-named, 1985 Hong Kong martial arts spectacle is likely light on plot, dialogue and other film-making indispensables. Still, the brawl that occurs around a snooker table is notable not only for the rapid-fire dispensing of the combatants, but also for the innovative use of a snooker ball as a temporary gag that is ultimately swallowed (?!) right before the ingestor is impaled on the taxidermied horns of some unfortunate ungulate.

7. Dead Presidents. The Hughes Brothers’ 1995 follow-up to their inaugural landmark film Menace II Society didn’t win favor with critics, but the pool hall scene, backed by James Brown’s “The Payback,” has all the visceral wallop of its predecessor. Anthony (Larenz Tate) and Cowboy (Terrence Howard) play a disquieting game of 8-ball that ends with Anthony becomes uncorked and beats Cowboy bloody with a cue stick all over the floor.

6. Force: Five. This 1981 action flick stars Chuck Norris BFF Richard Norton as a martial artist leading a team of martial artists on a rescue mission to save a senator’s daughter. After defeating an opponent in 8-ball, Norton quickly goes Australian-nutso when it appears his opponent will welch on a bet. Like Johnny Boy in Mean Streets, Norton uses the pool table as his playground for round kicking opponents and even makes smart use of a billiards rack to disarm an attacking cue-sticker. How Norton could shoot stick with that throwing star dangling from his neck I’ll never know.

5. The Krays. In the 1960s, Ronald and Reggie Kray were twin crime lords of London. The story of these underworld kingpins was brought to life in this 1990 biopic, starring real-life twins Gary and Martin Kemp. Known for ruthless acts of violence and intimidation, the Krays turned a snooker hall blood-red with their cutlasses in the graphically memorable “Say Thank You” scene.

4. Mean Streets.   Martin Scorsese’s iconic 1973 masterpiece about the daily violence of living on the streets of Little Italy should be mandatory viewing, ‘nuff said. That said, the ruckus that ensues when Johnny Boy (Robert DeNiro) insults the pool hall proprietor is cinematic, hand-held, perfection, with a single camera darting among the pool tables as they become props in a feral, claustrophobic fight sequence that includes Johnny Boy hopping mad onto a table, waving off his attackers with kicks and cue stick. The full scene, choreographed over the Marvelettes’ “Please Mr. Postman,” is available to watch below.

3. Rush Hour. In 1998, Chris Tucker and Jackie Chan starred as a pair of ill-matched cops, and in the process, launched a film series that collectively grossed about $850 million. In the original installment, Jackie Chan, a stranger to American culture and argot, begins a pool hall conversation with four poorly-chosen words, “What’s up, my nigga?,” thereby igniting a billiards ruction, complete with all the signature Jackie Chan acrobatics audiences love. Hopping over and under tables, parrying with cue sticks, clubbing with cue balls, this scene has it all.

2. Gangster High (original title: Pongryeok-sseokeul). Clocking in at more than seven minutes, the pool hall massacre in this 2006 South Korean film pivots from the hyperkinetic, with cue sticks clashing and feet flying, to the near balletic, with one man avenging his fallen comrade through a gruesome series of pool stick maneuvers. Heightening both the beauty and the tension is the switch to black-and-white, while Mahalia Jackson’s gospel spiritual, “Trouble of the World,” plays over the scene.

1. Carlito’s Way. “It’s magic time. After you see this shot, you’re going to give up your religious beliefs,” says Carlito (Al Pacino) in Brian De Palma’s award-winning 1993 crime drama. Pretending to set up one of his “famous trick shots,” Carlito uses the mirrored sunglasses of his opponent to see the gunman behind him, while he rockets a billiard ball, perched atop a cue chalk, into his opponent’s face. Now that’s a pool hall fight scene and getaway to remember!

So, there’s my Top 10 list of Billiards Brawls. Of course, there are a number of great pool halls skirmishes that didn’t make the list, but are nonetheless worthy of honorable mention, including Hard to Kill (1990), Boondock Saints (1999), Black Dynamite (2009), Trainspotting (1996), Code of Silence (1985), Die Bad (2000, South Korea), and Road House (1989). See a scene that should have made the cut? Let me know what movie would be on your Top 10. Otherwise, stay safe. You never know what might happen to you in a pool hall.

 

[1]       http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/918856-federal-study-bar-fights-tend-happen-darker-dirtier-bars-frequented-heavy

[2]       Graham K, Bernards S, Osgood DW, Wells S. ‘Hotspots’ for aggression in licensed drinking venues. Drug Alcohol Rev 2012;31:377–384

My Living Doll – “Pool Shark”

When asked how she ever learned to shoot pool so well, Rhoda Miller, the lifelike android played by the ever-sexy Julie Newmar, responds, “By computing the circumference of the spheres and the angles of trajectory plus the coordinates of the points of impact.” It’s a reasonable answer from a prototype robot built by the U.S. Air Force. It also establishes that Rhoda (aka AF 709) not only has the ability to learn new skills, but also that she will be able to play billiards nearly flawlessly (or, at least, until commanded to do otherwise by her caretaker, Dr. Bob McDonald, played by Bob Cummings).

My Living DollThe exchange described above is from the January, 1965, “Pool Shark” episode of the American science fiction sitcom My Living Doll, which aired for only 26 episodes on CBS. In the episode, Rhoda is recruited to hustle a wealthy pool shark in order to erase a debt indirectly owed by Dr. McDonald. Though Rhoda has never played pool, her ability to perfectly apply geometry and physics to the game enables her to shoot without error.

My Living DollThis is established by making a series of obligatory, but nonetheless eye-popping, trick shots, including the classic six ball “butterfly pool shot;” the famous two balls in the same pocket masse shot from The Hustler; a “railroad shot” (using the cue sticks as a railroad track); and a “paper bag shot,” in which the ball is hit with just enough momentum to enter a paper bag, flip it over, and exit the other side into the pocket. The full episode is available to watch on YouTube.

My Living DollMy Living Doll is hardly the only show to reduce billiards supremacy to physics and geometry, though it may have been the first. A quarter century later, the 1990 “Pool Hall Blues” episode of Quantum Leap enabled Dr. Sam Beckett to play masterful pool by relying on Al’s super-computer, which revealed the necessary angle for hitting every shot. Similarly, in the 1999 “Pool” episode of The Pretender, the prodigy Jarod becomes an ace billiards player through his “familiarity [with] the architectural theory of dynamic symmetry, as well as Descartes’ theory of coordinate geometry.”

What was, and remains, truly original about the “Pool Shark” episode of My Living Doll is embodying the geometry and physics aptitude inside a robot. Though it was pure science fiction in 1965, today, the notion of creating a robot that excels at pool, much the same way that IBM’s Deep Blue has become the definitive grandmaster of chess, has captured the imagination of scientists and inventors around the globe.

For starters, there is Deep Green, an industrial robot created by engineers at Queens University. The robot is “equipped with a cue and hung over a standard coin-op table. A digital camera reads the scene below and the robot’s computer brain compares it to 30 pre-stored images of an empty table, using the differences to decide where, and what color, the balls are. From there, the robot can nominate a ball and pocket and slide into action.”[1]

Then the robotic wizards of Willow Garage taught a Personal Robot 2 (PR2) to shoot pool. Created in response to a hackathon, the engineers spent one week teaching their robot hot to identify the pool table, locate a shot, and make it. They built it using their open source hardware platform and the ROS open source software library, which allowed them to adapt the existing FastFiz billiards software.[2]

My Living DollFinally, there is the Munchen Robot, created by scientists from the Technische Universität München in Germany. This dual-armed robot relies on a “camera mounted above the table and advanced physics engines to assess and detect the best way to approach a game of pool and execute the perfect [shot].”[3]

Though these robots all shoot an impressive game, none are indefectible, making them a futuristic far cry from the can’t-miss android Rhoda Miller. In fact, it is only when Dr. McDonald “forces” Rhoda to adjust her shot by two degrees, does she inevitably miss. Julie Newmar clearly appears to have had fun making some of the trick shots, but her slapstick sense of humor really shines when she misses and must “act angry,” resulting in myriad forms of cue stick destruction.

My Living DollThough the short-lived series was cancelled when it didn’t deliver the desired ratings, the show did yield Newmar her second Golden Globe nomination. Moreover and more important, with the abandonment of My Living Doll, Newmar was freed to assume the iconic role of Selina Kyle, aka Catwoman, in the 1966 Batman TV series, forever imprinting and arousing the minds of adolescents everywhere.

[1]       “Video: Pool-Playing Robot is Unbeatable,” Wired, 9/21/09

[2]       “Willow Garage teaches robot to play pool in one week,” SingularityHub, 6/16/10

[3]       “Billiard playing robot able to rack up eight balls with precision hustle,” Metro UK, 6/6/11

There Are No Thieves in This Village

When Poolhall Junkies premiered in 2002, I remember thinking, “Damn! That’s an incredible roster of talent for a billiards movie.” The film starred two former Oscar winners – Rod Steiger (In the Heat of the Night) and Christopher Walken (The Deeer Hunter), as well the incredible Oscar-nominated Chazz Palminteri (Bullets Over Broadway). My excitement was understandably a wee more muted about the casting of Ricky Schroder.

There Are No Thieves in This VillageBut, if one really wants to experience the who’s-who, one-two wallop of billiards movie casting, then the film to start with is There Are No Thieves in this Village (original title: En este pueblo no hay ladrones), a 1965 Mexican movie about how an impoverished community responds when three billiards balls are stolen from a local saloon.

Created in response to the Mexican STPC film union’s “First Experimental Film Contest,” a competition designed to rejuvenate the struggling Mexican film industry, There Are No Thieves in this Village was the directorial debut (and second prize winner) of Alberto Isaac. The movie is available to watch in its entirety here, but note it is in Spanish and without subtitles.

Shot in black-and-white with minimal budget in only three weeks in Mexico City and Cuautla, the film features a pantheon of modern-day Mexican art and culture intelligentsia. For starters, the movie is based on the identically-named short story written by the hitherto unknown, future Nobel Prize in Literature winning author Gabriel García Márquez, who subsequently had 30 movies made from his stories and novels, including Love in the Time of Cholera.   Marquez also appears in There Are No Thieves in this Village, making it the first of only two cinematic appearances in his career.

Also appearing in the film as a local priest is the Spanish filmmaker Luis Buñuel, who the New York Times referred to in his obituary as “a leader of avant-garde surrealism in his youth and a dominant international movie director half a century later.” Six of his films are listed in Sight & Sound’s 2012 critic’s poll of the 250 films of all time, and three of his films (Tristana; The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie; and That Obscure Object of Desire) have been nominated for Oscars.

Others in the movie include: film director Arturo Ripstein, who won the prestigious National Prize for Arts and Sciences; artist and iconoclast José Luis Cuevas; esteemed author Juan Rulfo; Surrealist painter Leonora Carrington; cartoonists Ernesto García Cabral and Abel Quezada; and critic and journalist Carlos Monsivaís. All of these future cultural leaders were part of a tight circle of friends kept by director Issac and writer (and future film critic) García Riera.

There Are No Thieves in This VillageIt is debatable whether There Are No Thieves in this Village is truly a “billiards movie,” as the only billiards in the film occurs in the opening sequence of three-cushion billiards. (For more on this billiards variant, check out the 2005 film Carambola.) In this sense, it is more akin to the 1991 Swedish film A Paradise Without Billiards, which depicts an immigrant’s life in a community that does not play billiards.

There Are No Thieves in This VillageIn There Are No Thieves in this Village, it is the absence of the balls, resulting from an act of larceny committed by the dim-witted troublemaker Damaso, that causes a community to unravel. Initially, the local denizens find themselves rudderless and without activity. That idleness turns to racist aggression when the community identifies a black man as the culprit of the crime. Damaso, showing no regret or concern for his actions, sits back like a passive spectator, as the black man is first beaten and later sent to sea for his crimes. In fact Damaso, who only took the billiards balls when his felonious efforts turned up no other booty, subsequently even toys with the idea of forming a gang and stealing additional balls as a money-making scheme. It is only when his pregnant wife can no longer contain her guilt by affiliation that Damaso reluctantly attempts to return the billiards balls.1

Watching the movie today, I’d say There Are No Thieves in this Village represents a watershed moment in Mexican film casting (and certainly in billiards movie casting), though the actual film is just of passing interest. I think this one reviewer said it best:

“Every time that I see this movie the result is the same, what were the conditions of the epoch to see such an incredible cast of characters. I haven’t seen another movie with so many artists, at least as important as the artists that appear in this movie… If someone is interested in Mexican culture at that time this film is absolutely a must.”

Thus, as an end to this post, and as a final postscript, let us say R.I.P. to Gabriel García Márquez, who passed away earlier this year in April.

1       My summary may be slightly inaccurate given both the movie and the short story were in Spanish.

The Strickland Story

Maybe it should come as no surprise that The Strickland Story documentary, produced and aired by Sky Sports Productions on November 27, 2013, provoked a lot of heated online debate, specifically around Earl Strickland’s claim, “I’m one of the greatest athletes America has ever produced.”

Strickland StoryIn the days after the documentary aired, billiards message boards and forums lit up with debates raging between ardent admirers and heated haters. Many professed their lifelong support for Strickland, calling him “amazing,” “a pool god,” and “brilliant.” On the other end of the spectrum, some of the borderline unprintable comments included, “Someone should just show him a picture of Efren Reyes and tell him to shut the f*** up!,” or “His arrogance and unsportsmanlike conduct make him an a**hole,” or “This guy is a nut sack! There is no talent here!! His ego is the only thing happening here!”

As a billiards movie blogger, and only an amateur pool player, I certainly do not feel qualified to deliver an opinion on whether Earl “The Pearl” Strickland is, in fact, the greatest. (Though given he won the US Open Nine-Ball Championship five times and the WPA World Nine-Ball Championship three times, I think anyone who tries to claim Strickland ‘doesn’t have talent’ should be forced to watch an endless loop of Strickland’s mind-blowing performance in the 1996 Million Dollar Challenge.) But, I do want to set the record straight on a few things:

  1. Strickland StoryThe documentary did not declare Strickland to be the “greatest player ever.” At some point in the lead-up to the film’s release or shortly thereafter, the title morphed into The Earl Strickland Story: The Greatest Ever, but this apposition never actually appears in the 46 minutes of film.
  2. Strickland is far from the first athlete to declare himself the “greatest athlete” in his/her sport. This superlative has been proclaimed, in one variant or another, by many, including Muhammad Ali (boxing), Ricky Henderson (baseball), Usain Bolt (track), Randy Moss (football), Federica Pellegrini (swimming), Maurice Greene (track), and Shaun Palmer (snowboarding). One or two of these athletes probably could make legitimate claims. Few, if any, probably set off such a backlash of anger.
  3. There have been many “Greatest Athletes of All Time” lists (e.g., Bleacher Report, ESPN). To my knowledge, not one of those lists has ever included a billiards player. Chew on that sad fact for a moment.
  4. Finally, Strickland’s complete quote was, “I’m one of the greatest athletes America has ever produced, whether the general public has acknowledged it or not. That’s how I feel.” Some may call this arrogance, others may call this confidence. In any event, it’s self-opinion from one of the most passionate, committed athletes alive.

Haters aside, there are probably two types of viewers for this documentary: (1) those who know very little about Strickland; and (2) those who know a lot about Strickland. Both viewers are in for a great documentary, which you can watch in its entirety here.

For those who know very little about Strickland, the documentary succinctly charts his biography, from learning to play billiards at the age of 8, when his father first snuck him into a pool hall in North Carolina to becoming “the best player in Houston by age 19” to entering tournament play and winning five US Open Nine-Ball Championships (more than any player in history) to participating in the Mosconi Cup. Some criticized the film for not including the Million Dollar Challenge or the Color of Money match against Efren Reyes, but with more than 50 titles and achievements to Strickland’s name, it would have been impossible to hit on all the highlights.

The film also effectively weaves in interviews with Strickland, sports event promoter Barry Hearn, and pool legends Johnny Archer and Rodney Morris, among others, to present the complexity of Strickland’s character. As Archer says, “He is not understood well. I think he is a genius on the pool table.”

Strickland StoryThose interviews reveal Strickland’s obsession with the sport (“Pool has taken over my mind, my soul, everything. I eat, sleep obviously, but other than that, I go to the pool table. It’s almost like a drug, I got to have it.”); his volatility (“he’s borderline mad”); his antics (i.e., jumping on the table after his win in Cardiff and declaring, “I’m king of the world.”); his occasional aggression to the fans (i.e., threatening them with a cue stick and later breaking it at the Mosconi Cup); and his intensity (“You think it’s some kind of game or something. It ain’t no game. I’m dead serious. I’ll shoot your liver out and hand it to you.”).

But, The Strickland Story is equally enlightening for those who sought more than the biopic headlines. For example, it delves into his bipolar personality, or what Barry Hearn calls his “Jekyll and Hyde character.” The film also reveals how the same fans he has been known to chastise are the ones who enabled him to pivot from a career as a gambler to a career as a professional player. (“People don’t clap for gamblers. I felt something inside of me when people clapped. Someone asked me for my autograph. I changed just like that…a better life where I was appreciated.”)

Strickland StoryRegardless of one’s familiarity with Strickland, it is impossible not to be moved by the documentary’s ending. Blaming both himself (“I made bad decisions. It’s not pool’s fault.”) and the general public (“Years ago, I would have been proud of who I am. That doesn’t exist anymore. You stripped me of that.”) for his pecuniary condition, he laments the state of pool today, including the lack of respect and financial options available for players:

“I have to live in a city of 30 million to make some money…exhibition are gone…I’m lucky I still have a name…every time we get some hope, it gets dashed…we have no hype, we’re all broke…I don’t understand how you could desert this game, how could my country desert this game…I am here to protect and preserve this game the way I found it…if pool deserves to die and not get us respected and make us millionaires, then all sports deserve to die.”

In all the many posted comments I read about The Strickland Story, the one that resonated most with me was from Aleo on the Two Plus Two forum. He writes, “The sad thing about this documentary is that you can see how heartbroken [Strickland] is about the state of the game. Everyone always talks so much about how talented or explosive Earl may be, but as good as he is, what’s always impressed me most about him is how much he genuinely LOVES pool. Honestly I’m not sure anyone loves pool as much as Strickland does.”

Fresh Prince of Bel-Air – “Banks Shot”

Banks ShotThe late 1980s and early 1990s experienced a surge of black sitcoms. Two of the leaders in that category were Family Matters, which first aired in September 1989 and had 215 episodes over 11 seasons, and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, which first aired in September 1990 and had 148 episodes over six seasons. Family Matters, the more successful of the two, was the second-longest running black sitcom (behind The Jeffersons), though Fresh Prince arguably had a bigger impact on popular culture, as the vehicle behind the meteoric rise of its star, Will Smith.

A more practical exercise around comparing the two shows is in the genre of billiards TV, where each series made a contribution: the “Fast Eddie Winslow” episode of Family Matters (November, 1990) and the “Banks Shot” episode of Fresh Prince (February, 1991).

In “Fast Eddie Winslow,” the high-schooler Eddie fancies himself a pool shark after winning a series of games. But, when he agrees to raise the stakes to $25/game, he is quickly hustled, owing his opponent now $250. With violence imminent, Eddie’s father and grandmother show up in the nick of time, and erase the debt with a series of trick shots.

Banks Shot“Banks Shot” aired just four months later, and essentially recycled the storyline, albeit with a few positive twists. (It would not be the last reenactment of this billiards trope. The Steve Harvey Show episode “Pool Sharks Git Bit” copied it six years later.) In “Banks Shot,” high-schooler Will (Will Smith) ignores the admonitions of his Uncle Phil (James Avery) by taking the Mercedes Benz to a seedy pool hall. There, he makes some fast money by besting a few of the locals in eight-ball. (This includes making a shot through the legs, doing a no-look combination, as well as hitting a handful of can’t miss multi-ball shots, all while strutting to Snap!’s 1990 anthem, “The Power.”) But, like the impudent Eddie, Will’s cocksureness blinds himself to the true ability of his forthcoming opponent, Charlie Mack. Boasting “ain’t no thing like a chicken wing, my game is all that,” Will rapidly goes down $300. Suddenly realizing he’s been hustled (or a victim of “creative money management,” as his opponent says), Will must put up his uncle’s car as collateral until he can pay the debt.

In “Banks Shot,” it’s not the father-grandmother coming to the rescue, but rather Uncle Phil. This is an improvement over the “Fast Eddie Winslow” progenitor, since Uncle Phil does not disclose to Will his plan for getting back the money. In fact, he intentionally misleads Will, first by attempting to make a legal argument for restitution with the pool hall proprietor, and then by insisting that billiards “can’t be that difficult – I’ve seen it on TV,” and playing Charlie Mack in a $20/ball game of pool, which Uncle Phil subsequently loses.

Banks ShotNow further in debt, Charlie Mack successfully raises the stakes to $100/ball. [SPOILER ALERT!] It is at this moment that the hustler becomes the hustled, as Uncle Phil asks Geoffrey (his tag-along butler) for his cue stick Lucille, which Geoffrey promptly unsheathes from his pants leg. Armed with Lucille, the usually humorless Uncle Phil becomes a performer, swaggering around the table to the song “Soul Man,” and making consecutive trick shots, including a one-hander (while eating a sandwich), four-rail shots, and four-ball combinations. The pool hall patrons, including Will, can only watch in awe, as Uncle Phil wins back the debt, plus $600. Turns out Uncle Phil frequented a fair number of pool halls in his days, which is also why he tried to shelter his nephew from the dangerous elements that reside within. (“You think I’m trying to spoil your fun? I just want you to come home in one piece.”)

The episode may lack originality, and the moralistic ending is beyond heavy-handed, but it’s a hoot to watch the actor James Avery, who sadly died earlier this year, shed his patriarchal mien and assume the jaunty pool hustler persona.

“Banks Shot” is available to order online through Amazon.

Wilson Jones

In October 2013, snooker returned to its birth country when the Indian Open, a professional ranking snooker tournament, was held in New Delhi.   It was the first ever ranking snooker event played in India. Among the 64 participating players from around the world, two of the lower-ranked players, Pankaj Advani and Aditya Mehta, were both from India. Surprising many, both made it to the quarter-finals, where they played one another, and Mehta made it all the way to the finals, where he lost to China’s heavily-favored Ding Junhui.

Almost exactly one decade before that landmark historical event, the world lost one of the greatest Indian snooker (and billiards) legends, Wilson Jones, a man likely not well-known among many billiards fans, though surely revered by Advani and Mehta, who would have each been just 18 years old when Jones died.

Fortunately, the Films Division of India released from its vaults a 17-minute documentary film, Wilson Jones, about the snooker sensation.   Directed in 1971 by Vijay B. Chandra, the biopic reveals snippets of the life of this humble champion by interspersing billiards footage with family interviews and scenes of Wilson Jones presiding at his Bombay home and proudly displaying his stereo system. The film is available to watch here:

As is shared in the film, Wilson Jones not only won the amateur National Billiards Championship of India 12 times, and the World Amateur Billiards Championship (now known as the ISBF World Billiards Championship) twice, in 1958 and 1964, but also was India’s first world champion in any sport. He won numerous Indian awards, including the Arjuna Award (best sportsman), which is shown in the film (3:10), and the Dronacharya Award (best coach). At the time of documentary, Wilson Jones had already retired from billiards. He says the decision was driven to spend more time with his family, as well as a conviction that the best time to retire is when one is “at the top of [his] career.”

Wilson Jones 2The film’s narrative is not that revealing or insightful, though it’s interesting to hear one unnamed player describe him as an “extremely tough man to beat in competition because of his cool temperament and great determination,” and another describe him “as a person better than he is as a player because he is considerate, helpful, always willing to give a hand to any person who wants to learn.”

Perhaps, more disappointing is that the film itself is shot rather unimaginatively, given direction by Vijay B. Chandra and production by Pramod Pati, two leaders in Indian experimental film of that era. While there are a handful of unusual close-ups and camera angles sprinkled through the film, it’s still fairly vanilla, in comparison to Chandra’s surreal Child on a Chessboard or Pati’s psychedelic short film Abid.

Toward the end of the film, Wilson Jones says that, “in snooker [India is] a little way behind. The gap has been narrowed a bit [but] what we need is [for] these snooker boys to go out more often…and eventually, India should be very good.” It may have taken longer than he had hoped, but with players like Advani and Mehta now making global headlines, it seems Wilson Jones’ legacy has become complete.