Tag Archives: nineball

A Nonet of Nineballs

9-Ball in The Color of MoneyWhile the masses know the game of 8-Ball, the fanatics know the game of 9-Ball. Often characterized as a more difficult, more demanding game, 9-Ball exudes a heightened exclusiveness. It’s the cool kids’ clubhouse, the hipsters’ hideaway. Is it any wonder that Rihanna’s character in Ocean’s 8 is named Nineball?

Perhaps not surprisingly, the billiards movie genre’s most famous members – The Hustler, The Color of Money, and Poolhall Junkies – all focus on 9-Ball, even if it’s not spelled out in the title.

But, what happens to the mystique when everyone is obsessing over it? As it turns out, nineball is the focus of more than just the above billiards trifecta; in fact, 9-ball (in all its lexical variants) is in the title of nine different films and TV shows! So, chalk your cue, and get ready for a Nonet of Nineball-Named movies.

Nine Ball (1995, 2023)

Nine Ball (2023) movieThe newest addition to this cinematic ennead is Nine Ball, which has a history considerably more interesting than the movie itself. Shot on Super 16 in 1995 for a budget of approximately $30,000, the movie was an alternate for the 1996 Sundance Film Festival. Unfortunately, the opening at Sundance didn’t emerge; moreover, with no offers for distribution, the producer Rich Grasso, who also acts in the film, could not raise the additional $250,000 to finish the movie. The unfinished negative sat in a closet for 25 years, until the boredom of COVID prompted Mr. Grasso to give Nine Ball another look. With advances in technology, and streaming options that didn’t exist a quarter century ago, Mr. Grasso was able to complete his billiards opus, which is now available to watch on Amazon Prime. The movie stars Kenny Johnson (S.W.A.T.; The Shield) in his first feature film, though some of the other actors (e.g., Eugene Williams, Steven Benjamin Wise), who did not remotely achieve the same subsequent level of stardom, were far more compelling.

Nine Ball’s storyline is fairly rote. A quintet of friends in a small town find joy in their weekly get-togethers at a local dive bar. They have free access to alcohol and the pool table, where 9-ball is not a game, it’s a “religion.” But, beneath the booze-infested bonhomie, there is tremendous tension: economic, racial, relationships, dead-end ambitions. For all the talk about 9-ball, very little is actually shot, as players’ turns keep getting interrupted by drunken rage, scatalogical jokes, and bro-bonding. Most of the movie feels more like a play, with the five characters joshing and jostling for space in the single barroom. There are peaks of entertaining or dramatic dialogue, but they are undercut by the annoying narrative technique in which ghosts of the characters cut between past and present or hover in the scenes’ backgrounds.

Special thanks to director Victor Bevine and producer Rich Grasso for their interviews.

9 Ball (2012)

9Ball movieThe grand poobah of nineball-named movies, or at least the most well-known, is this APA-sponsored, Jennifer Barretta-starring film, with special appearances by Jeanette Lee and Allison Fisher.  The movie broke ground for casting a professional player (Baretta) as the main character, rather than in a supporting role to assist with the technical shots. It also focused on a female protagonist, which is a genre rarity. And, not surprisingly but most unusually, 9 Ball sought to portray pool as a professional sport. The actual movie was rather polarizing for audiences. In my original review, I rated it meh but acknowledged its obvious love and respect for the sport of billiards.

9 Ball (2012)

Directed by Isabel Logroño Carrascosa, this unimaginative Spanish short film is instantly forgettable. The movie revolves around a trio of characters, who are involved in an insipid game of 9 ball, while they seek to double cross one another. I don’t know what was a bigger distraction: the hair metal t-shirts the two players sported or their infuriating inability to make more than two shots in a row. The film is available to watch here.

9-Ball (2015)

9 Ball (2015) short filmA life of decadence. The ultimate price to pay for those sins. A game of 9-ball to decide it all. Blah, blah, blah…yeesh, that sounds like trope overload. Nonetheless, I’ve been searching for this Australian short film on-and-off for close to three years. I even successfully connected with the director, Darwin Brooks, in 2020, who committed to tracking down a copy for me.  But, his email is no longer active, nor is BMC Productions, the company behind the film. This movie is officially WANTED. If you have any information on it, please contact me.

Nine-Ball (2004)

Nine Ball (2005) tv seriesStretching across 20 episodes, the Taiwanese television series Nine-Ball (aka Billiard Boy) focuses on You Li, a country boy / billiards hustler, who falls in love with a girl on the internet, thereby provoking the rage of her jealous ex, Kuai Da. Kuai Da happens to work for Shao Shi Enterprise, a company that has a reputation in acquiring pool halls using violence. Not surprisingly, Kuai Da seeks to leverage his commercial power to destroy You Li and the things he loves. Resentment, bad mojo, and lots of billiards ensues, but unfortunately, I’ve seen none of it because I can’t locate the series. The only discoverable relic is a music video for the series’ theme song, “I’m Not A Hero,” by David Chen. This series is officially WANTED. If you have any information on it, please contact me.

Nineball (2007)

Why does the film’s narrator, a self-described “billiards junkie,” cover his face with a rag and get called a “monster” by the local children? Why does he use his spoon as a cue stick to pocket raw potatoes? And, why does he introduce us to a crew of 9-ball players who compensate for their missing arms by using other parts of their bodies (or others’ bodies) to support their cue strokes?

billiards short filmsRicky Aragon’s hilarious, crude, and jarring 14-minute film rapid-fires the questions, continuously disorienting the viewer with ever-changing music and characters. For a moment, we’re doing mathematics with billiards balls. Then, our narrator is at the 2006 Phillipines World Championship, having a Forrest Gump moment, as he appears behind winner Ronato Alcano or takes a selfie with referee Michaela Tabb. Then, it’s on to the narrator’s true love, Donita, the girl with the “billiard boobs.”

What is going on? Hold tight. It all resolves with a 9-ball match, where our narrator’s puerile attempts to distract his opponent cause a freak accident – a lodging of the nineball in the narrator’s nose. He is a victim of his own obsession, deformed by his passion. Yet, the film’s true punchline comes in the final 30 seconds. As the befuddled doctor struggles to select a tool that might remove the ball, a cue stick magically descends from above. It is the narrator’s hero and savior – (the very real) Efren “The Magician” Bayes, who shoots the nine, grossly dislodging the ball, along with the surrounding nasal gelatinous membrane. It lands on a billiards table with a thud, but no one stops. The grotesque ball becomes part of the game’s action, proving there is nothing that can interfere with the indefatigable relationship between billiards and Filipinos.

A special thank you to director Enrico “Ricky” Aragon and the Cinemalaya Foundation, which secured a copy of the film for me to watch.

Nine-Ball (2008)

This Swedish short film is very unlike the others in this group. Directed by Nikolina Gillgren, the movie is about neuropsychiatric disorders, such as ADHD, Asperger’s and Tourette’s Syndrome, and how people who have these disorders, like the film’s lead character David, struggle with social dysfunctional behavior and social exclusion. A pool hall, and some awkward games, provides the milieu for discussing the fear, loneliness, and the discomfort that comes from social exclusion. My full review of Nine-Ball is here.

Ride the 9 (defunct)

Fingers were crossed, wood was knocked on, and stray eyelashes were wished upon that Ride the 9 would make it to the silver screen. Blake West and Jordan Marder first started teasing YouTube audiences in 2011 with a trailer (seen below) for this billiards movie that sported a Guy Ritchie vibe, a killer soundtrack, gritty New Orleans set locations, and jaw-dropping trick shots courtesy of Florian “Venom” Kohler. While there were many fits and stops, as late as 2016, hopes were still high that the film would find funding and get made. But, unfortunately, this one rode the 9 to the cinematic graveyard. My original write-up on Ride the 9, based on interviews with Mr. West and Mr. Marder, is here. 

Behind the Nine (2003)

Behind the NineA great cruelty of the industry is that Ride the 9 could not get made, but Behind the Nine found its way into home theaters. This suffocating, molasses-paced film focuses on an underground two-week, 9-ball tournament that pays $500,000 to the winner and $500,000 to the organizer, who puts on the tournament to “make ends meet.” The movie collapses under the weight of terrible acting; a boring and distasteful script riddled with racist and homophobic language; unimaginative cinematography and direction; and – the coup de grâce – a preposterous and stultifying approach to billiards. My full review of Behind the Nine is here.

Someone once said, “In 9-ball, the only thing harder than the shot is trying to hide your smile when you sink it.” That may be true, but it seems equally difficult to come up with a movie title that does not call out the nine.  Maybe change the focus to 8-ball? Oh wait, that’s not a good idea either…

Poolhall Junkies

“Poolhall Junkies is a porno movie for billiards fiends.”

Alas, I can’t take credit for authoring that beautiful sentiment (it belongs to the staff writer Purple for Movie Magazine), but it’s a zinger of truth.  From the opening scene, as the camera methodically, seductively explores the baize of the billiards table, the interior of the pocket, the smoothness of the rail cushion, the length of the cue, and even the symmetry of the rack, one feels they’ve entered a world of pool fetishism.  It’s no wonder that this is the mise-en-scene of the 2003 billiards movie Poolhall Junkies and the home of its star, Johnny “Sidepocket Kid” Doyle, a pool player so good that “the cue was part of his arms, the balls had eyes, and the thing that made him so good was that he thought he could never miss.”

Poolhall JunkiesIt’s also then no surprise that Doyle is played by Mars Callahan, the movie’s director and writer, and an incredible pool player in his own right.  In making the film, Callahan clearly wanted to make a billiards movie.  He used his own life growing up fatherless in Los Angeles, hustling and playing pool starting at the age of 12, to form the basis of the movie, though it would take him 10 years to get it to the silver screen.

The storyline for Poolhall Junkies is pretty simple (and often criticized for being a retread of better movies such as Rounders).  Johnny is a teen billiards prodigy who aspires to be a pool professional.  But, his “mentor” uncle Joe (the excellent Chazz Palminteri) has bigger plans to “educate” him and turn him into a pool hustler.  Fifteen years later, when Johnny breaks from his mentor, he tries to start a new life away from pool-sharking.  But, Joe, hell-bent on revenge, won’t let him leave, and sics his new protégé Brad (the head-scratchingly cast Rick Schroeder) on Johnny’s friends and family, creating for Johnny a world of debt and problems that can only be resolved in a – wait for it…you guessed it – 9-ball showdown.

Okay, so the plot is beyond predictable.  Can we move on now?  Let’s talk about the pool!  The movie is a billiards bonanza of rapid-fire strokes, rail assist jumps, table-length draws, absurd masse shots, double-bank carom shots, with some of the most eye-popping shots performed by billiards legend Robert “Cotton” LeBlanc, who not only was a technical pool advisor for the film, but also makes a cameo in the film at the Olhausen $100,000 9-ball Shootout, along with trick-shot maestro Mike Massey (as St. Louis Louis).

But, Poolhall Junkies does not just rely on professionals to dazzle.  To the contrary, the movie is notable for creating an aura of authenticity through its use of continuous wide-angle pool shots, taken not just by Callahan, but also by the other players in the movie.  Perhaps, the most famous shot in the movie is the frozen cue-ball carom kick shot shown below that Johnny uses to hustle his girlfriend’s boss at a party.

In Poolhall Junkies, this shot, which immediately inspired thousands of audience members to try to recreate it at their local pool halls, is done – on the first take, no less – by Johnny’s partner and bank-roller Mike (the scene-stealing Christopher Walken).  The shot is then repeated by Callahan…with one hand! (For a full explanation of the physics of this shot and others in the film, check out the article from Dr. David Alciatore in his series, “Billiards on the Big Screen.”)

Billiard movie aficionados will also note Callahan’s clear homage to The Color of Money in everything from the use of pool shot montages and the selection of recognizable pop songs to power the pool scenes (e.g., “Werewolves of London” in The Color of Money;  “The Payback” and “Use Me” in Poolhall Junkies) to the overt Color of Money poster in the local pool hall. More subtle tributes include the use of a deafening crack of the break to signal a one-of-a-kind pool player, as well as Johnny’s pompadour and white-on-black HUSTLER t-shirt that are reminiscent of Vince’s (Tom Cruise) bouffant hairdo and white-on-black VINCE t-shirt.

And yet, as an ode to billiards, Poolhall Junkies carries with it a negative underbelly, namely the close equation of pool with hustling.  While the movie opens with the line, “I don’t want to be a hustler. I want to be a professional,” it so romanticizes the pool-shark, with its short cons, sang-froid and hyper-masculine lifestyle, that it comes dangerously close to tainting the sport in the process.

As skilled as all the pool players are in the movie, they ultimately rely on deceit and even an old-fashioned ass-stomping to succeed.  Johnny lands a mobile-home sales job by tricking the company owner into making a bet he can’t win.  Another character wins a fast $200 by duping two guys in a drinking game.  Johnny’s brother attempts to beat Brad by only playing him on a pool-table he rigged with a crooked leg.  Brad, allegedly the 13th ranked player in the US, must resort to a cheap “four balls off the table” hustle to win money in 8-ball.  And, the most egregious example of all, in the final $100,000 showdown between Johnny and Brad, Johnny only wins because he cons his opponent into letting him take the otherwise “impossible” shot.

In this respect, it’s interesting to compare Poolhall Junkies to Anthony Palma’s 2012 movie 9-Ball.  Both movies start with a pool prodigy who wants to pursue the professional path, but is held back by a manipulative uncle intent on exploiting their skills for financial gain. In 9-Ball, league play is the path to nirvana, and the billiards professionals are portrayed as angelic messengers to aid in that pursuit.  On the contrary, in Poolhall Junkies, the professionals lie, intimidate, and even physically attack, and hustling, as evil as it may be, is the ultimate magnet and the only way to win over the girl, free the brother, and take the $100,000 pot.

Poolhall Junkies is widely available to rent or watch online or on DVD.

Poolhall Junkies