Name your Top 4 and your Bottom 4 Newman movies.
Top
Cool Hand Luke
The Hustler
The Sting
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Bottom
Rally Round the Flag, Boys
From The Terrace
Paris Blues
The Silver Chalice
The boy turned 83 in January. He was already 32 when I first noticed him in The Long Hot Summer. I’ve seen at least half his movies and have enjoyed more than half of those.
I guess I’d rank him in my Top 20 actors of all time.
I’m not sure that I’ve seen 8 Paul Newman movies, but number 1 is The Hustler (in my top ten films) and number 2 is The Sting.
Worst by default is The Color of Money, for which he won the Oscar for playing Fast Eddie Felson that he should have won for the original performance.
So true. To have missed the Oscar for at least five better movies than the Fast Eddie Redux just shows how lame the Oscar is to start with.
We need a thread to select the deserving Oscar winners of the past 20 years to replace the losers who won them.
Off the very top of my head - My top is “The Verdict”. Absolutely. He was fantastic in that.
I used to like "Butch Cassidy but tried to rewatch recently and just couldn’t get through it. I didn’t think the movie aged well at all, but Newman was good, of course. Same for “Hombre”.
Hud
Cool Hand Luke
The Hustler
Hombre or Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
The Towering Inferno
When Time Ran Out
Slapshot
Harry and Son
This is for Newman’s performance not the film over all (for instance, the film The Sting was better than Harper, but I felt Newman was better in Harper).
Top:
Harper
Hombre
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Somebody Up There Likes Me
The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean
(If televison were allowed I would put, Bang the Drum Slowly - that was incredible)
Bottom:
Cat on a Hot Tin Room (I just felt he was too melodramatic)
*Lady L (*nice cast, but nobody, including Newman clicked)
*Rally Round the Flag Boys *(everybody’s timing was off)
*Torn Curtain *(Newman missed the character or something)
*Silver Chalice *(painful)
Slapshot! The hell you say! That was a work of art.
I’ve missed pretty much all the movies so far listed as his bad ones. My top four are probably:
The Hustler
Butch Cassidy…
Cool Hand Luke
The Sting
Anybody else here ever see The Rack, in which he plays a Korean War vet on trial for treason after breaking under pressure while in a POW camp? Not a great movie, but there are some scenes between Newman and his dad that are just wonderful. It must have been one of his first five or so movies, and he’s really good in it (Disclaimer: I haven’t seen the movie in about 10 years, so I might be, as they say, misremembering.)
Sorry about putting five instead of four. I just misread it or something. And I agree with Bayard’s opinion on Slapshot (although I think he says it somewhat tongue in cheek). It gave you a side of Newman you rarely get, it gave you an interesting look at a tougher side of sport that you seldom, if ever, get and it combined humor and pathos well.
Have any of you seen Twilight? Hackman, Sarandon, Garner, Witherspoon, Channing, Schreiber. Newman is a “retired” detective. Good noir I hadn’t seen before last month or so when it was on TCM or Retro or one of those.
Other notable (not my Top 4) Newman goodies:
Absence of Malice
Hud
The Outrage (remake of Rashomon – weak overall, but Newman was fun; Shatner in a minor role as a priest!)
There have been many such threads, along with annual “who should have been nominated/won this year.”
This thread is reminding me of other Newman movies that I’ve seen. The Verdict, Harry and Son, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Butch Cassidy…now y’all are gonna make me have to do more work.
What we have here…is a failure to communicate!
Great movie.
Careful…one of them might have a rifle. (I heard that they cast Paul and Robert in each others role to start, but wisely switched them during shooting)
Favorite Newman moments:
Kicking the guy in the nuts — Butch & Sundance
Burping at Robert Shaw — The Sting
The finger to nose thing — The Sting
Ohhhhhhhh Shiiiiiiiit — Butch & Sundance
I’m physic – Harper
At least you got the color right – Long Hot Summer
That’s where I’d stick Harper. I thought he played the part very well, it’s just the movie itself was almost more of a “made for TV” style. Another he nailed was Sometimes A Great Notion but it probably won’t make a lot of top fours.
Heh, Bayard, it’d probably had fared better with me were I raised around ‘hockey culture.’ My loss.
Favorites-
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
The Hustler
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Slap Shot
I don’t think I have seen any of his less favorable films… well maybe most people don’t like Slap Shot but I think it’s funny
Another thing I don’t remember hearing before Newman:
“Yeah, well…”
No telling how many times that line has been used. One of his catchphrases as far as I can tell.
Can you think of a role of his where he was more the convincing bad guy/villain than in Road To Perdition? Many times he was a bandit or outlaw or on the other side of the law, but I mean really bad guy.
I’m a littel surprised that *Nobody’s Fool * hasn’t been mentioned. Maybe my favorite of his movies, and a case where the film was possibly better than the book.
The Hudsucker Proxy
Thanks. I sort of remembered that but it’s been a long while since I saw it and when I saw it coming on last week or so after watching the first few minutes of it I couldn’t stand to wade through it again.
One of the Coen’s efforts that left me cold. Same with Barton Fink.
Whoa, wait a minute…you mean that salad dressing guy was in movies? 
Yep. And the popcorn guy, too.