Category Archives: Billiards Movies

The Billiards movies category is about movies that prominently feature billiards or that have plots focusing on billiards.

Second Chance

Allison Fisher.  Pan Xiaoting. Kim Ga-Young. Kelly Fisher. Jennifer Barretta.  Chieh-Yu Chou. Jasmin Ouschan. Cha Yu-ram.  All in one movie? The last time so many billiards pros appeared in a single film was probably 1980 for Robert Ellis Miller’s The Baltimore Bullet.

Second ChanceBut, this is no Baltimore Bullet.  The all-star packed film is Second Chance, formerly known as Nine Ball, as well as A Girl Got Her Cue. And that octet of billiards legends is not even the film’s biggest celebrity draw – it’s Wen Shang-Yi (aka the guitarist “Monster” from the Taiwanese mega-watt rock band Mayday – once dubbed the “Chinese Beatles”[1]) in the lead role as Hsieh Shuang-Fong.

I first heard and wrote about Second Chance in April 2014, when I added it to my “Wanted!” list of movies, since there was little information available on the film.  Over time, details emerged about the film, largely in Asian press, including eventually a trailer and music video, in preparation for the film’s release in Taiwan in November 2014. Originally titled Ni zhuan sheng, the film adopted the English title Second Chance as it moved across the globe in early 2015. Finally, late last year, the film became available on DVD (with English subtitles) thanks to its distributor Edko Films. You can buy it here.

Second ChanceThe movie begins with Shuang-Fong, a washed-up, drunk, former billiards champion, who now scrapes by selling Rice Wine Stew Chicken, drawn out of his decade-long retirement by his niece Hsieh Jen-hsiang (Peijia Huang). She recently lost her parents, one of whom was Shuang-Fong’s elder brother, in an auto accident.  Lacking a proper guardian, Jen-hsiang is at risk of being sent to a foster home, as well as losing her family billiards hall, Champion Billiards, to Hsu Che-yung (Jason Wang), a loan shark, and the reigning world men’s 9-ball champion.

Like Rocky Balboa begrudgingly coming out of retirement to train Apollo’s son in Creed, or more to the genre’s point, like Fast Eddie Felson training the cocky Vincent Lauria in The Color of Money, the besotted Shuang-Fong is initially reluctant to get involved with his niece’s life.  But, sensing the headstrong schoolgirl will stop at nothing, including gambling in pool, to save the family pool hall, he ultimately relents.

Second ChanceAt first, he merely observes her playing style: “The shot is too weak…the wrist is too stiff…precision is high, good control over the balls…attack but no defense – too ambitious…bad at long straight shots.” Predictably, such perceptions soon translate into a billiards practice regiment, complete with solving jigsaw puzzles under time constraints (to build concentration), shooting a cue ball narrowly between two glasses (to increase accuracy), and taking early-morning jogs (to build endurance and strength). The over-familiar practice montage (cf. Rocky; The Karate Kid) is absurdly hokey, yet nonetheless enjoyable, particularly when powered by Monster’s cover of Roxette’s 1989 song “The Look” with Taiwanese pop stars Luantan Ascent and Jia Jia on vocals.  (Though this song does wear out its welcome after excessive use in the film.)

Even for non-billiards enthusiasts, the movie hits its groove when Jen-hsiang is on the baize. Some exciting playing occurs when she is vanquishing amateur opponents, but the best play comes once she decides the only way to save her pool hall is to compete in the New Century Women’s 9- Ball Championship for the multi-million dollar prize (cf. The Baron and the Kid; Kiss Shot).

Second ChanceIt’s at this point, more than halfway through Second Chance, when our billiards stars appear, entering the tournament hall in file form to the deafening sound of their names and nicknames:  The Duchess of Doom. Kwikfire. The Queen of 9-Ball. Little Devil Girl, etc. And in the caboose position, the hitherto unknown Jen-hsiang.

Once again, cue “The Look.”

In rapid order, Jen-hsiang beats her first opponent, Jasmin Ouschan, the World Games 2005 gold medal winner, and her second and third opponents, Kim Ga-Young and Kelly Fisher respectively, both women’s WPA world 9-ball champions. Bewilderingly, very little of the games are shown, so it’s hard to appreciate these miraculous upsets.

In the semi-finals, Jen-hsiang competes against Chieh-Yu Chou, winner of the 2012 Amway Cup. There is, at last, a decent amount of billiards play, including a fine masse shot, and after a near snookering, a great jump shot 2/9 combination to win.

That leaves her to play the final match against China’s Pan Xiaoting, the 2007 women’s WPA world 9-ball champion.  Director Wen Yen Kung heightens the tension in this match through a mix of slow-motion, rapid editing and amplified sounds (of balls connecting, falling in pockets), as well as numerous dazzling combinations, masses, and jump shots.

Second ChanceIt’s hardly a SPOILER ALERT to share that Xiaoting wins the match 9:8, dashing Jen-hsiang’s plan to retain control of Champion Billiards.  And that’s because the movie opened with Shuang-Fong preparing for a match, before flashing back nine months.  So, that loose end still dangling, the audience knows that the real fate will be decided in this final match, which I won’t reveal here.

As one reviewer correctly noted, “Second Chance is hardly going to win points for originality…It’s a film that plays by the rules – you’ll recognize the same moves we’ve all seen a million times.”[2] But, it’s also a movie that goes down easily, fusing its positive themes of redemption and family with a geek chic passion and well-trained visual eye for billiards and its beauty.

[1]       http://www.cnbc.com/2014/03/19/he-chinese-beatles.html

[2]       http://www.easternkicks.com/reviews/second-chance

[Wanted!] Running Out

On the IMDB Message Board, there is only one comment associated with the billiards movie Running Out.  “IMPOSSIBLE TO FIND!!!” wrote thejollillama. Similar messages have popped up on the AZBilliards Forum, such as Cuebacca’s post, “What’s the deal with that pool movie, Running Out? I keep checking the internet periodically, but it never seems to become available.”

Running OutFancying myself somewhat of a Sherlock Holmes of billiards-themed cinema, I typically love these laments, as I’ve been able to track down quite a few hard-to-find films and television episodes (e.g., Genuine Article – “Puzzles and Pool Cues”; the Swedish short film Nine Ball; A Paradise Without Billiards).  However, after much research and numerous dead-end explorations, all detailed below, Running Out, like the near-mythical treasure chest of Forest Fenn or the golden owl La Chouette d’Or, remains out of reach, a billiards Bigfoot.  So I beseech my readers:  If you have any information about this movie or the whereabouts of the people involved in its creation, please contact me directly.

Let’s start with what we know.  In October 2001, the billiards movie Running Out released at the Riverside Film Festival, followed shortly after at the Inland Empire Film Festival, and then at the High Desert Film Festival.  Directed by Byron Cepek for an estimated budget of $50,000, the film focuses on three pool hustlers:  Cindy (an upcoming Hollywood starlet), Tanya (a strung-out addict who makes money as a dominatrix), and Rex (a sex addict).  The players interact and compete, living with the consequences of their actions, and the playing culminates with an ending that online reviewers described as “incredible,” “intense” and “hard to watch.”

As expected, the film is not available to buy or rent through any standard retail channels or file-sharing sites.  Sometimes festival organizers have access to old releases, but not in this case.  The High Desert Film Festival no longer exists, nor does the original Inland Empire Film Festival.  And the Riverside Film Festival, which recognized Running Out with its Best of Show award, only had files dating back to 2003, according to the event’s Film Programmer Nancy Douglas.

Having exhausted the festivals, I pivoted to the director. Unfortunately, Mr. Cepek only made this one film.  No other info is available on Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.  While I found a Yahoo email for him in a response he made to a Google Group posting, the email bounced back immediately.

Eric James Niemi wrote the film and played the lead (Rex), though curiously, he has been removed from the IMDB Cast & Crew listing.   Apparently, Mr. Niemi studied film at California State University, Fullerton, with Professor Diane Ambruso. According to an article in The Daily Titan, Mr. Niemi had sold a script he had written in Professor Ambruso’s class to an Australian producer.[1]  When that deal fell through, Mr. Niemi revealed that he “started drinking and returned to playing pool for a living…and quickly fell into debt [from gambling].”[2] This confession seems to coincide with when he wrote and starred in Running Out.   Mr. Niemi’s story then takes an odd twist, in which he started selling bootleg copies of Adobe software to make money and protect his family from the loan sharks.  He was indicted in November, 2001.[3] No more information is available.

The other two film leads, Suzy and Tanya, were played by acting unknowns Sarah Davis and Vanessa Davis, respectively.  Sarah Davis never made another movie.  Vanessa Davis, on the other hand, stopped starring in films, and instead, turned to doing makeup and hair for movies.  Nominated for a Primetime Emmy in 2005 for her hairstyling work on Warm Springs, Vanessa may be able to shed light on the film’s mysterious history.  Unfortunately, she has been unresponsive to my attempts to reach her at the Atlanta phone number she lists at the top of her online resume.

Most of the remaining actors in Running Out were unknowns who never appeared in another film or who had very limited film careers.  There is some speculation that the Tony Watson who played Fat Tony may have been the North Carolina billiards player “Little” Tony Watson, though I’ve been unable to get confirmation.

As for the production companies associated with Running Out, both Reaction Machine LLC and Knight Pictures are no longer in business.   Mr. Niemi, who used the alias Eric Knight, was the likely owner of Knight Pictures.  Reaction Machine lists Erin Niemi, presumably a relative of Mr. Niemi’s, as the Managing Partner.  But, those companies’ dissolution coincides well with Mr. Niemi’s U-turn from screenwriting to software pirating.

I also hit an impasse when I started to sift through the technical and production team.  There is no available information after 2003 on the producer Katherine Shattuck, the composer Cody Tyler, or the film editor Jason Blackwell.  At the other end of the spectrum, David Eichhorn, the film’s dialogue editor, who has a filmography with 150 credits including three primetime Emmys and numerous Emmy nominations, told me via email that he couldn’t even remember working on Running Out.

The second unit director, Diego Martien, now goes by Diego Porqueras and is the President and CTO of Deezmaker, a California-based manufacturer of 3D printer kits. Mr. Porequeras promptly responded to my inquiry, but only to share that he “lost touch with the person that did [Running Out] and never really saw a cut on it. (It got a bit messy with production).” However, he did share with me a music video he made at that time to test certain concepts from the film.

Having run out of people associated with the film to contact, I considered tracking down the three user reviewers who graciously shared their thoughts on IMDB.  But, whiningfilmcritic has not posted since 2002, and hollyhills and rocker247 were one-and-done film critics.

Running Out may lack the recognition of The Player, a better-known “missing” billiards movie that has confounded billiards enthusiasts for more than 40 years.  But, if the recent discoveries of the Franklin Expedition Ship or the remains of the U-26 are proof that mysteries can take at least a century to solve, then there is a smidgeon of hope that time has not “run out” for finding this missing movie.

[1]      

[2]       http://misc.writing.screenplays.narkive.com/0ojQQtRC/eric-james-niemi-on-his-felony-conviction-please-read-this[Note: this link is no longer active]

[3]       https://www.justice.gov/archive/criminal/cybercrime/press-releases/2001/niemi_indict.htm

Three Card Monte

Three Card Monte.v2Three Card Monte barely counts as a billiards movie.  But in oeuvre with very limited Canadian representation (i.e., The Understudy: Graveyard Shift II; Behind the Eight Ball; Manitoba Sharks; Hiccups – “Car Pool”), the decision to relax the definition for a little more inclusion from the Great White North seemed straightforward.  Unfortunately, the fact the film is also barely watchable has now led to some second-guessing on my end.

Released in 1978 at the Toronto Film Festival, Three Card Monte tells the story of Busher (Richard Gabourie), a gambling drifter, who begrudgingly allows Toby (Chris Langevin), a 12-year old orphan, to accompany him in his hustling and flimflammery, and builds a close relationship with him in the process.

Directed by Les Rose (Gas; Hog Wild – never heard of them?  Neither had I.), shabbily written by Mr. Gabourie, and starring a pack of unknowns and amateurs, the movie limps along across a too well-tread path of familiar tropes and clichéd two-dimensional characters.   There are two half-witted grease monkeys who chase Busher around Toronto seeking revenge for getting scammed in pool; a gaggle of equally dull-brained craps players who fail to notice Busher is playing with loaded dice; a loose hitchhiker who sleeps with Busher but is pulling her own con; and a well-intentioned hitchhiking friend who eats Twinkies and unwittingly lets a 12-year-old feel her up (?!). And, then there is Busher, who, for all his negative tendencies (e.g., lying, conning, hustling, thieving, drinking, having sex in front of a minor, kidnapping a minor, etc.), is portrayed as a genuinely good-natured guy, just trying to gain a little edge and get back on his feet.

Credibility is not the film’s calling card.

A cardinal problem with Three Card Monte is the complete lack of originality.  The film feels like a mishmash of – or maybe a paean to – superior works about the grift, specifically the movie Paper Moon (1973) and the book Billy Phelan’s Greatest Game (1978).  In Paper Moon, Ryan O’Neal stars as a Depression Era con-man who develops a partnership with a girl (Tatum O’Neal), who may be his daughter. The film had multiple Oscar nominations and won Ms. O’Neal a Supporting Oscar.  In Billy Phelan, the future Pulitzer Prize winning author William Kennedy tells the story of a young pool player and hustler who lives on the edge, making a living in Albany pool halls and card parlors.

(For what it’s worth, Mr. Gabourie won the Canadian Film Award – aka the Etrog – for Best Actor in Three Card Monte. That’s hard to believe until one is reminded by film critic Jay Smith that this particular award is “given by presenters no one knew, to recipients no one recognized, to films no one had seen.”)

Three Card MonteAs for the billiards, Three Card Monte begins on a promising note.  Busher enters a snooker hall and begins practicing on a table.  For viewers accustomed to seeing American pool on the big screen, the snooker table looms large and it’s a welcome reminder how different the game is.  Soon, two local bozos think they can make a buck off Busher and challenge him to a game.  They quickly lose their money, then their car keys, in a rapidly edited snooker sequence, consisting mainly of potted balls.  Tempers rise as Busher leaves, and the players vow revenge (though it was not clear if they were hustled or simply sucked and lost).

That opening scene sets up the whole film, as Toby allies himself with Busher (by racking his balls), and Busher (along with the voluntarily abducted Toby) goes on the lam to escape his post-snooker hustling fate. Unfortunately, though Busher is frequently carrying his cue stick and seems to be looking for his next sucker match, there is no more billiards; the subsequent hustles shift to craps and finally three card monte.  So much for that “hot cue” notably highlighted in the movie’s tagline.

The Rack Pack

Everyone loves a great sports rivalry between individuals.  A great sports rivalry can lead to memorable matches, heated emotion, superior trash talking, occasional violence, and of course, incredible displays of athletic prowess. Even better, pretty much every sport can point to some defining dogfight which has electrified spectators.

The Rack PackConsider:  Cristiano Ronaldo-Lionel Messi (soccer); Arnold Palmer-Jack Nicklaus (golf); Chris Evert-Martina Navratilova (tennis); Bobby Fischer-Boris Spassky (chess); Larry Bird-Magic Johnson (basketball); Muhammad Ali-Joe Frazier (boxing); Brian Lara-Sachin Tendulkar (cricket); Jahangir Khan-Jansher Khan (squash); etc.  In fact, the ongoing grapple between Formula One auto racer Niki Lauda and James Hunt was so irrefutable that director Ron Howard made the feud the basis of his 2013 movie Rush.[1]

To that list, we can add the multi-year face-off between world snooker champions Alex “Hurricane” Higgins and “Interesting” Steve Davis, a rivalry that ran through the 1980s and, as a result, turned a back room parlor game into a sport watched on television by more than 18 million people. Fortunately, the bitter contest between these two giants is exceptionally captured in Brian Welsh’s movie, The Rack Pack, which premiered exclusively on BBC’s iPlayer in January, 2016.

The film begins in 1972, with Higgins (Luke Treadaway) defeating John Spencer to win the World Snooker Championship. Led Zeppelin’s “Black Dog” is used to evoke this epic changing of the guard, with the working-class, semi-unhinged Higgins now emerging as the “People’s Champion.”

The Rack PackAs Higgins injects his maverick, I-don’t-give-a-fuck personality into the sport, fast-forward to 1976, when promoter Barry Hearn (Kevin Bishop) test-drives Steve Davis (Will Merrick), a young, up-and-comer.  Seeing the bowl-cut teetotaler for the first time, Hearn brilliantly quips about Davis, “God, he’s pale…I bet he gets sunburnt when he opens the fridge.”  (Of course, that’s genteel compared to Higgins’ remark when he first eyes his red-headed future nemesis: “What happened?  Did a carrot fuck a snail up the arse?”)

Hearn believes there is big money to be made from snooker. In the robotic Davis, he senses gold, assuming he can mold Davis into a formidable and intimidating player.  Hearn also knows Higgins’ swagger and bravado are signs of vulnerability, saying, “[Higgins] plays to the gunnery like there’s an award for the best shot.  He can’t take a round of applause to bed. He’s like a little boy lost, desperate for approval. Emotion, Davis, is the enemy of success…We need to create an aura of invincibility around you.”

Thus begins an Eliza Doolittle-like transformation of Davis, from a video-game-playing, milk-drinking, socially awkward looby to a stone-cold, laser-focused, snooker assassin, with every mannerism, from crossing his legs to holding his drink, rehearsed for maximum effect. In Hearn’s words, this is the game of “mental snooker.”

The metamorphosis is incredible.  After losing terribly to Higgins in the quarterfinals of the 1980 World Snooker Championships, Davis returns the following year to win the World Championship.  Though Higgins returns the favor in 1982, Davis effectively becomes a snooker juggernaut, rebounding to win the world title five more times in 1983, 1984, 1987, 1988, and 1989.  He boasts, “There is no one around who can concentrate long enough to be a threat to my dominating records for years to come.”

Musically, Davis’ ascent is complemented by some high-powered voltage by an incredible, 1970s-1980s British rock soundtrack, including “Another One Bites the Dust” (Queen), “Money For Nothing” (Dire Straits), “Sunshine of My Love” (Cream), “Voodoo Child” (Jimi Hendrix), “Tiny Dancer” (Elton John), and “Who Are You” (Who). Those aural anthems are used liberally, along with montages of potted balls, newspaper articles, and magazine covers, all creating a whirligig of snooker and promotional activity around the unstoppable Davis and Hearn, his master puppeteer.

The Rack PackIn addition to Higgins and Davis, The Rack Pack features (brief) appearances by an  extended pantheon of actors portraying snooker greats from the decade, including Kirk Stevens, Jimmy White, Dennis Taylor, Cliff Thorburn, Tony Knowles, and even a 16-year-old Matthew Harrison (who Davis embarrassingly defeats 134-0).

While The Rack Pack probably fawns too much on Hearn, the film doesn’t hold back on showing the meltdown of Higgins, whose repeated losses to Davis both corroded and eroded Higgins, turning him into a coke-fueled, whoring, foul-mouthed, absent father and emotionally abusive husband. A number of the scenes evoke Paul Thomas Anderson’s Boogie Nights, both in their portrayal of the impact drugs can have on a career and in their stark portrayal of a man out-of-touch with the times.   (Interestingly, some reviewers felt the movie was too clement in its portrayal of Higgins, saying the character was “romanticized to brush over some of the more unsavory and extreme aspects of his personality.”[2])

Like many biopics, The Rack Pack struggles with what life chapters to leave on the cutting room floor.  Thus, the last quarter of the movie tends to drag on, as Davis achieves new strata of fame by selling everything from coffee to fragrance; making a quiz show board game; and joining a number of other snooker professionals to sing “Snooker Loopy,” a Chas & Dave song that surprisingly hit the #6 position on the UK Singles Chart.[3]

But, the film emotionally reconnects with its audience in the final scenes, when Higgins, defeated and bankrupt, approaches Hearn, offering to let him become is manager.  Hearn responds, patiently and truthfully,  that  “Snooker needs you, but I don’t need you [Alex]…The millions out there don’t tune in to watch the snooker, they watch for the soap opera….You’re destroying yourself, and millions enjoy watching the process.”  It’s a proper denouement for the Hurricane, whose star would never shine again.  The onetime millionaire died in 2010, penurious, from a mix of malnutrition, pneumonia, and a bronchial condition.

Billiards movies fans often lament that both the lack of good films since The Color of Money (1986) and the absence of snooker films.  Cry a tear no longer.  The Rack Pack is high-quality entertainment, as well as a compelling biopic on two titans whose incredible skills and contrasting personalities fueled one of the most impressive rivalries in sports history.

To the frustration of many, The Rack Pack is available exclusively on BBC’s iPlayer, which is not viewable outside of the United Kingdom.  However, there are many known workarounds, such as the Hola unblocker plugin for Chrome, that can spoof IP addresses and eliminate this restriction.

[1]       There is a wonderful running list, with commentary, of individual sports rivalries on Quora, though sadly there is no mention given to any rivalries existing in billiards.

[2]       http://www.snookerbacker.com/2016/01/19/the-rack-pack-review-a-triumph-of-sound-and-vision/

[3]       Goofy as it is, “Snooker Loopy” holds the #3 spot on my Top 10 Billiards Songs and Music Videos.

Rated B for Billiards: Top 10 Billiards Bedroom Scenes

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Certainly, ever since Marilyn Chambers got ravished on the snooker table by the gardener of her father’s estate in the 1980 pornographic classic Insatiable, the billiards room has been the locus of many sexual encounters, dalliances, and romps in film.  The scenes have ranged from the erotic or coquettish (e.g., Cinderella Liberty) to the brutal and vicious (e.g., Watchmen; Unholy Rollers).  Something about balls, sticks, long flat felted surfaces, and the 30-inch height of a pool table that lends itself to cinematic lechery.  I therefore present my Top 10 Bedroom Billiards Scenes (though, practically speaking, none of these occur in the bedroom) for your consumption, amusement, and critique. Enjoy!  #NSFW

  1. pool table sceneBedazzled. Director Harold Ramis chose in 2000 to remake the original 1967 Bedazzled by casting Brendan Fraser as Elliot Richards and pin-up goddess Elizabeth Hurley as the Devil in this film about a hopeless dweeb granted seven wishes to snare the girl of his dreams in exchange for his soul. In this early scene from the movie, the Devil seduces Elliot into having a conversation, but not before rendering him tongue-tied with her body-rocking dress and her break that pockets 15 balls in one shot.
  1. pool table sceneDays of Our Lives. At some point in 1992, the daytime soap opera aired an episode, which included this scene, reuniting Carly Manning (Crystal Chappell) and Bo Brady (Peter Reckell), who engage in some truly McCheesy dancing to Joe Cocker’s “You Can Leave Your Hat On.” Of course, Carly didn’t leave a lot else on, as Bo picks her up and mounts her on the table, effortlessly rolling the cue ball into the corner pocket for maximum effect.
  1. pool table sceneScorned. Shannon Tweed, wife of KISS frontman Gene Simmons and the star of roughly 60 erotic thrillers, doesn’t have time to finish her billiards stroke before Andrew Stevens begins his with a little backdoor billiards in this scene from the ever-missable, softcore 1994 thriller. Amazingly, this film even spawned a sequel, albeit with no billiards scene.
  1. pool table sceneBody Chemistry 4: Full Exposure. One year after Scorned, Ms. Tweed is (literally) back on the billiards table in this 1995 straight-to-video softcore film. Dispensing with any pretension of being used to play pool, the billiards table in this scene is simply another setting for Ms. Tweed to disrobe, writhe, gyrate, moan, arch, and express her curious comfort with getting nailed on the baize.
  1. pool table sceneAnd God Created Woman. Thirty-two years after Roger Vadim directed the French film Et Dieu Créa La Femme (And God Created Woman), he remade the film under the same name in 1988, this time casting the seductive Rebecca De Mornay as the vamp Robin Shea. In this billiards scene, where the “winner says do, and the loser does,” Shea memorializes her victory over James Tiernan (Frank Langella) with the command that he get down on his knees, remove her underwear, and perform oral sex on the table.
  1. pool table sceneAlfie. In this scene from the 2004 film about a cockney womanizer learning the hard way about the dangers of his actions, Alfie (Jude Law) and Lonette (Nia Long) strut around a purple felt billiards table, playing “I Never,” and alternating among shots of pool, shots of 1800 tequila, and shots of Lonette’s cleavage. Jukebox tunes from Teddy Pendergrass (“Love T.K.O.”) and The Isley Brothers (“For the Love of You”) ensure Alfie will do more scoring tonight than just on the table.
  1. pool table sceneFemme Fatale. In 2002, Brian De Palma cast supermodel Rebecca Romjin in this crime drama about an ex con-woman Laure/Lily trying to put her life back in order. The mediocre movie, now largely forgotten, did turn heads and raise the adrenaline with its seductive opening pool table scene. The scantily clad Romjin engages in a slow strip tease that shows no skin, but suggests everything. The sudden juxtaposition of sex and the ensuing violence is equally memorable.
  1. pool table sceneMen in Hope (original title: Muzi v Nadeji). The film poster notwithstanding, this 2011 Czech film has nothing to do with billiards, except for this one lascivious scene in which the bodacious Sarlota (Vica Kerekes) enters the parlor, wearing a skin-tight, eye-poppingly-open, red mini-dress, and is introduced to Ondrej (Jirí Machácek). Along with Ondrej’s father, the trio begin to play three-cushion billiards. Sarlota’s cleavage distracts from the game, but that’s fiddlesticks compared to the delirium subsequently caused by Sarlota shimmying out of her pink underwear and using it as a hair tie, presumably so she can aim better.
  1. pool table sceneRed Shoe Diaries – “Double or Nothing.” Zalman King’s popular erotic Showtime drama series was formulaic with its lite-plot stories of sexual awakening that combined nudity, soft lens cinematography and mood music. In this 1992 episode, the super-sultry Paula Barbieri stars as a woman who is forced to survive by relying on her pool-playing skills…which naturally involves assuming all sorts of positions on a pool table.

 

  1. pool table sceneThe Last Picture Show. Peter Bogdanovich’s 1971 Best Picture about the coming-of-age of a group of 1950s high schoolers is worth watching for countless reasons, but the billiards sex scene is certainly among the most unforgettable. Jacy Farrow (a 21-year-old Cybill Shepherd) lures Abilene (Clu Gallagher), her mom’s older lover, to an empty pool hall, where a brief attempt to play pool is replaced with Abilene having sex with Jacy on the table. The close-ups of Jacy’s hands reaching through the netting of the table’s pockets will stain your memory for some time.

Phew, I’m sweating.  Well, if you can still focus your attention, let me know what would be on your Top 10 list.  And, no, Two Nude Girls Playing Billiards doesn’t count.  Of course, with the forthcoming production of 50 Shades Darker (2017), which may include the highly-gossiped billiards scene (cf. “I am going to spank you, then fuck you over this billiard table.”), I may need to revisit my rankings in the near future.

pool table scene

Up Against the 8 Ball

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Up Against the 8 Ball Up Against the 8 Ball, the 2004 billiards comedy directed by Troy Curvey Jr on a shoestring budget, packs a wallop of positivity into its 90 minutes. Overcoming obstacles, pursuing higher education, helping one’s neighbor – all these uplifting themes get ample on-screen treatment. But, no amount of feel-good moralism can save this film from its slim-jim plot, insipid script, bad acting, and horrible billiards sequences.

The film begins with Krista (Iva La’Shawn) and Monique (Tawny Dahl), two women who just lost their scholarship funding their tuition at a historically black college, needing to find $10,000 to complete their final semester and graduate. After ruling out robbing a bank and stripping, the girls decide to compete in the Protect Your Stick Condoms National Pool Tournament, which has a $50,000 winner-take-all award.   This should be easy, according to Krista, who was raised shooting billiards by her father, a well-known pool hustler. (The origin of Monique’s skills are not revealed.)

The first step is to win the regional doubles tournament, where they get exposed to a rogues’ gallery of paper-thin opponents, including: Marcus (a local lothario) and his partner Fat Tony (who succeeds in making shots only by equating balls with similarly colored food – e.g., the 1-ball is corn-on-the-cob, the 6-ball is collard greens, the cue ball is mashed potatoes); two Irish priests; an ignoramus that talks about the need to “use English instead of Spanish”; and most offensive, an Asian duo accused of using their “kung fu” to win. (Interesting note: one of the Asian opponents is played by James Kyson, who years later would star as Ando on NBC’s hit show Heroes as well as get named by TV Guide as one of “Hollywood’s 25 Hottest.”)

The ladies win the tournament, which is hard to believe given the actresses are clearly uncomfortable holding cue sticks and the only shots shown on screen are incredibly simple ones. Victory clinched, the women head to Las Vegas, accompanied by their stereotypical gay friend Fruity Jackson (T. Ashanti Mozelle). Expecting they’ll be treated like royalty when they arrive, they are instead dropped off at a squalid depot, where friendly hookers roam under the watchful eye of JT (Jay Cooper), a soft-spoken “not your traditional kind of pimp.” JT quickly befriends Krista and Monique, and after confirming they are not seeking to work the streets, drives them to the Tasmahall Hotel (and not the Taj Mahal Hotel, as the ladies hoped). Once at the hotel, there is some comic relief provided by the proprietor, played by Arnez J, an emerging comic recognizable on BET.

Eventually, after a series of distracting and uninteresting scenes – a budding romance between JT and Monique; an attempt by Marcus to drug (and presumably rape) Krista; Fruity’s efforts to secure the $1,000 tournament registration fee; a schlubby mob boss trying to rig the tournament by recruiting Caroline, a well-known hustler – the tournament begins.

Up Against the *And, wow, is this some painful pool to watch. It’s as if the technical advising was done by a team of 2nd-graders. No one knows how to play. The incredulity and lack of humor hit their nadir when the final match narrows down to our collegiate ladies versus Caroline and her lesbian partner. With Caroline & Co. clearly winning, Monique resorts to baring some midriff and thigh, thereby distracting Caroline and making her partner so jealous that she forfeits in anger.

For a film that includes such virtuous (albeit vapid), dialogue as, “This is our only chance to graduate and make something of ourselves,” it’s amazing and disturbing how much of the film traffics in two-dimensional stereotypes and derogatory comments, such as referring to the final match as the “collegiate chicks [against] the lesbian hos.” Somewhere stuck between crude comedy and righteous homily sits Up Against the 8 Ball, which makes for a pretty terrible movie.

Up Against the 8 Ball is available to watch online or on DVD.

Perfect Break (in production)

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Perfect BreakUntil very recently, the “snooker movie” was considered by many to be extinct, a sub-genre that disappeared in 1991 after Legend of the Dragon pitted fish-out-of-water Stephen Chow against snooker sensation Jimmy White in a yakuza-backed tournament. But, propelled by the success of the BBC iPlayer 2016 biopic The Rack Pack, which details the tempestuous rivalry between ‘80s snooker stars Steve Davis and Alex “Hurricane” Higgins, the snooker movie has been resurrected and is making headlines once more.

Certainly, the surge in interest bodes well for Perfect Break, a British snooker-themed comedy that is in post-production and seeking a distributor for an anticipated 2016 summer release. Produced by Len Evans and directed by Ian Paterson, Perfect Break is a low-budget, family film about the once great snooker player Bobby Stevens (Joe Rainbow), whose humiliating loss has led to his current career nadir performing trick shots wearing a luchador mask. Through a chance encounter with a young girl, he regains his appreciation for the sport – and his nerves – enabling him to compete in the Jimmy White Invitational Cup. The full trailer is available to watch here.

According to Mr. Evans, a snooker player who admits he is “not very good,” the impetus for the film’s creation was the straight-forward desire to make a billiards movie. (Amen!) Feeling pool had been portrayed well on the silver screen (Mr. Evans’ favorite billiards movie is The Color of Money), Mr. Evans opted instead to focus on snooker – a sport that, per his research, had never been addressed on film. (His research appears to have overlooked Legend of the Dragon as well as Billy the Kid and the Green Baize Vampire.) That decision was also well-suited for the selection of his director, Mr. Patterson, who is a member of the Romford Snooker Club.

Perfect Break

Jimmy White and John Virgo

For Perfect Break to succeed, it was critical to cast some household snooker names in a few key roles. Fortunately for all of us, Mr. Evans thinks big, and working through the Snooker Association, he secured Jimmy White and John Virgo. Mr. White, of course, is not only one of the sport’s greatest as a six-time World Championship finalist and a 29-time tournament winner, but also brings with him a large fan base, as evidenced by his 102,000 Twitter followers. (He is also a veteran of snooker movies, having starred in The Legend of the Dragon.)   Mr. Virgo is known within the snooker community for his ability (he was once ranked 10 in the world) and commentary, as well as his 11-year run as co-host of the famous snooker game show Big Break. According to Mr. Evans, the duo had quite the good time on set, and there are “some excellent outtakes of the pair messing their lines up and having a great time laughing and joking.”

Cineastes can also look forward to a decent amount of billiards: 18 minutes of Perfect Break is devoted to on-screen snooker, including the filming of a full maximum 147 break. According to Mr. Evans, the team insisted that no CGI was used, so instead they recruited Jamie Rous, an excellent Pro player (once ranked 128th in the world) who is relatively unknown, to shoot the scene, with seven cameras filming simultaneously to ensure perfect continuity.

So, if you love snooker and want to take the family to a film that promises “no swearing, guns, or violence,” then be on the lookout for Perfect Break.

Note: Since this movie’s release in 2020, I have posted a review.

Behind the Nine

Often before I blog about a particular movie, I’ll skim whatever user reviews I can find to get a temperature read on past audience reaction. For the 2003 billiards movie Behind the Nine, the reviews were particularly virulent and condemnatory. Nolan Canova bemoaned the “f*%king lifetime it took to sit through this movie.”[1] Kris Langley decried the film was “one of the worst examples of transparent attention-whoring I’ve ever seen in my life.”[2] And Fast Larry excoriated, “It’s so stupid, so bad, it is a disgrace. Just a bunch of ding dong nincompoop morons with a nice camera.”

Behind the NineHere’s the truth: these reviews are spot-on accurate. The film really is that bad.

For a suffocating, molasses-paced, 78 minutes, Behind the Nine, directed by Martin Kelley, focuses on an underground two-week, 9-ball tournament that pays $500,000 to the winner and $500,000 to the organizer, Alex (Derek Seiling), who puts on the tournament to “make ends meet.” The tournament has 200 players, but by the time the film begins, “192 gamblers, hustlers, and hacks have hit the streets empty-handed.” The movie’s audience is subject to watching the remaining eight players compete in a single elimination, race to seven games.

Though the premise is reasonably intriguing, Behind the Nine 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.

Let’s start with the concept of the 200-person, single elimination tournament. Mathematically, that’s impossible, as the total number of people needs to sum to a power of two (e.g., 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256).

Even if there were 200 players, the math is still borderline questionable. A single-elimination tournament with 200 players equals (roughly) 198 matches (100 matches in 1st round, 50 matches in 2nd round, 25 matches in 3rd round, etc.). Since it’s a race to seven, assume the average match lasts one hour, with 15 minutes in between each match. Do the math and it adds up to 247 hours of tournament play – equivalent to 18 hours/day for the two weeks. Possible? Sure, with a full tournament staff. But, with just an organizer (Alex), a bouncer (Mouse), a bartender (Beth), and a hot girl (Wendy) whose job is to rack and make out with the female players (?!), I’m dubious.

Behind the NineMaybe I wouldn’t harp on the math if the opening lines of the movie were something other than Alex’s voice-over: “Three things I love: statistics, baseball, and pool. My dad wanted me to be an accountant, but as I said earlier, that’s for suckers.”

Speaking of statistics, the movie’s viewers are frequently shown Alex’s “files” on each player, which includes his computed odds of each person winning the tournament. But, given it’s a winner-takes-all pot, and there is no apparent side-betting, then there’s no conceivable reason to calculate a player’s likelihood to win, as it doesn’t impact any person’s financial outcome. This “love of stats” shows a blatant ignorance about its actual use.

Putting down the calculator, this tournament occurs in the basement of Alex’s house on a single, cheap-ass, red-clothed pool table. Call me cynical, but I don’t imagine there are too many players with $5000 of dispensable cash that are going to jump at the chance to play competitive pool on some twenty-something’s hobby table.

Behind the NineMore to the point, betting $5000 on a single elimination tournament is no paltry entry fee, considering a typical tournament fee might cost but one-tenth that amount. One would think the players must be pretty decent (especially if my assumptions about a race to seven lasting one hour) to risk that kind of moola. However, judging by the level of billiards shown among the eight finalists – i.e., the top 4% — these players are outright awful. Only the most basic straight-on shots are attempted, and many of these shots are missed. I don’t know what is more bat-shit crazy: the bonkers notion that any viewer would believe these borderline actors are pool players or that any viewer would wish to endure watching so many minutes of piss-poor pool.

Is there anything positive to say? Yes, Ted Huckabee, who plays the muscleman Pigman in the film was able to survive being cast in this cinematic dreck and now portrays Bruce on the mega-hit television series The Walking Dead. The rest of the Behind the Nine cast? Not so lucky.

Behind the Nine was once available to purchase on DVD, but no longer. It can be watched in its entirety online here.

[1]          http://www.crazedfanboy.com/npcr/popculturereview194.html

[2]          http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0317135/reviews?ref_=tt_urv

 

Chalk

Chalk billiards movieDesperation hangs in the smoke-filled air of the Crabtree, the run-down Southern California pool hall that serves as the primary setting for director Rob Nilsson’s 1996 independent drama Chalk. The locale is dirty, dank, littered with beer bottles and empty peanut shells. Thanks to the visual style of cinematographer Mickey Freeman, the air looks and feels sickly. It is no wonder that Watson (Edwin Jones), the Crabtree proprietor and a former heroin addict, spits blood or sleeps in his clothes, or that his son Jones (Johnnie Reese) always seems to be sweating. With its dilapidated centerpiece of a pool table, the Crabtree is a place where Watson’s adopted son T.C. (Kelvin Han Yee) can rule the roost hustling pool, but otherwise is terrified to leave. Which of course is at the heart of Nilsson’s metaphor: the pool hustler lifestyle is something almost cancerous and inescapable.

As one pool hustler shares with T.C., “Pool players don’t make as much as volleyball players–even dart players. If you’re not in the top 10, forget about it.” The hustler (played by “The Road Man” Chris McDonald) goes on to lament that as a result of pool, he lost his house, his wife, everything he had.

It’s an interesting perspective. Within the canon of billiards movies, many of which belie a certain romanticism toward the pool hustler, there is none as bleak as Chalk in its outlook on billiards and as hopeless in its portrayal of the player. Characters do not flash wide smiles, or run fancy trick-shots, or talk smack in the hustler’s argot. They play impatiently, the prey desperately on high school kids, and they wait listlessly for action – for opponents who may never materialize.

The main story, which takes a while to emerge from the haze, involves Jones coercing his brother T.C. to play a high-stakes game of pool against a man named Dorian James (screenwriter Don Bajema), who is a ranked professional with some anger management issues stemming from his violent past. (James is so psychotic that one truly disturbing scene has him screaming at his girlfriend to sodomize him with his own cue stick. Arguably, this scene did little to build fans for the film among the larger billiards community. As Freddy “The Beard” Bentivegna wrote in his “Encyclopedia” of Pool Hustlers, “This is evidently how Hollywood thinks a pool hustler bonds with his cue stick before a big match. [This is a] ridiculously insulting movie.”) T.C. only accepts the $10,000 match when he learns Watson is dying and this could be a chance to prove himself to his adopted father. Only later is it revealed that Jones has convinced his father to bet his entire life savings on the game.

The actual match, which consumes the last 45 minutes of the movie, is the first to win seven games in 9-ball. A variety of different editing and filming styles are used, some clearly an homage to Martin Scorsese for The Color of Money, but none succeed in giving this endless scene much life. As the players trade games, the pool drags on. Even the near rape of T.C.’s girlfriend, and the near death of Watson, don’t puncture the droll of the match. Subbing in for Yee and Bajema respectively are real-world pool sharks Billy Aguero and Chris McDonald, but even the expert billiards playing cannot pump energy into the final third of the film, which deliberately moves at an unnecessarily slow pace.

Chalk billiards movieThough the movie has trouble breathing beneath the weight of the Hollywood conventions it tries to avoid, it is refreshing to know its origin. In 1992, Nilsson, who had gained acclaim for his 1979 award-winning film Northern Lights, moved into a transient hotel San Francisco, motivated by a search for his missing brother. There he helped found the Tenderloin Action Group, a free acting workshop for homeless and inner city residents. Within the group, Nilsson discovered a number of promising performers and wrote Chalk with the help of Bajema, his longtime collaborator, around the talents of many of these nonprofessional actors.   In fact, aside from Bajema and Edwin Jones (who plays Watson), the rest of the cast are nonprofessionals.

Chalk is available to buy on DVD from Rob Nilsson’s website Citizen Cinema.

Il tocco – la sfida

Il Tocco - La SfidaViewing Enrico Coletti’s 1997 Italian crime drama Il tocco – la sfida (also known as Rack Up or The Cuemaster) is akin to watching a billiards movie mashup, blending recognizable tropes and characters from other billiards movies into a film that, while hardly original, remains nonetheless entertaining, especially given its star, Franco Nero, and its emphasis on 5-pins, a popular form of carom billiards in Italy.

The movie begins with the rules of 5-pins shown on the screen, while a cue stick is assembled and the table is set up, including the standing of the pins. (Ten years later, the Mexican billiards movie Carambola used a similar opening technique to explain the game of three-cushion billiards.)

For those unfamiliar with 5-pins, the game is played with 3 balls and 5 pins. One’s cue ball must hit the opponent’s cue ball and the red object ball to knock over one-inch pins to score points, with white pins worth 2 points each and the red center pin worth 4 points, unless falling on its own, in which case it’s worth 10 points. (Five-pin billiards is closely related to goriziana, or nine-pin billiards, which was the focus of the 1983 Italian movie The Pool Hustlers.)

Franco Nero, the Golden Globe nominated actor (for Camelot), who has since become well-known for his marriage to actress Vanessa Redgrave and his portrayal of the evil general in Die Hard 2, stars as Jesus Barro, an immensely talented 5-pins player, who makes the decision to play in a high profile tournament in order to win enough money to rescue his friend Paco from debt and save Paco’s pool hall from the extortionary grip of local mobster Scalesi (the rather unconvincing Imanol Arias).

However, when Barro is asked to throw the game, pride interferes, and he beats the gangster’s stooge, Wan Yo aka “The Monk.” That foolish decision ultimately results in Paco dead and Barro with a broken hand, ruining his billiards career. (Hark the throwback to the thugs that broke “Fast” Eddie Felson’s thumbs in the 1961 billiards classic The Hustler. Of course, the scene was also recycled 6 years after Il tocco – la sfida in Poolhall Junkies.)

Il Tocco - La SfidaUnable to hold a cue stick, Barro hits the bottle until he observes the waitress from Paco’s pool hall, Andrea Sanchez (Ruth Gabriel, winner of the 1994 Goya Award, the main film award for Spain), make some difficult shots. Realizing she is a prodigy, Barro begins to tutor her in the art of both billiards and hustling, hoping she can win back the bar and revenge his reputation. The set-up is a pretty clear rip-off of Fast Eddie “mentoring” Vince in The Color of Money.

As Barro explains to Sanchez, there is “your classic sucker: he’s got money and wants everyone to know it. Usually loses a lot but pretends not to care. Self-restraint is their priority. They are the easiest to beat… [Pointing at a slovenly player] Never trust appearances. He look like a bum, but underestimate him and he will win your money, even your underwear… [Pointing at a menacing player] Now sharks never look you straight in the eye. They love money, not the game itself. They are bad losers and will probably start a fight. Avoid them.”

But, Barro is also aware that “nobody will bet on a woman,” so he convinces Sanchez to pull a Tootsie, cutting her hair (to look eerily like Ralph Macchio in The Karate Kid) and changing her clothes to become a man, since “we are living in a male chauvinistic world of assholes.” Oddly, Sanchez’s voice doesn’t change, though no one seems to notice.

The charade is sufficient to get Sanchez entered into the 32-person Cuemaster (5-Pins) World Championship, in which the winner’s pot is 32 million pesetas (approximately $270,000 in 1997), though the real money is made on side bets (cf. The Color of Money).

Sanchez, who only started playing months ago, is there to compete against real-world 5-pins legends, such as Gustavo Enrique Torregiani, the Argentinian three-time world champion of Italian 5-pins; Vitale “The Terminator” Nocerino, the runner-up to the 1997 World Cup; the “Blue Streak” Giorgio Colombo; and Salvatore Mannone, the 1993 World Cup winner.

Credibility wanes significantly when Sanchez starts beating these champions, moving ever closer to the winner’s circle. The montage of incredible 5-pins shots, including a spectacular eight rail four-pointer, interwoven into the scene more than compensates until the quarterfinals when Barro advises Sanchez to throw the game. With her unconvincing and unimaginative miss, the movie hits its nadir, and has a hard time recovering, even when Barro’s rationale for having Sanchez exit (the little-known “Paragraph 32 of the championship rules”) is revealed, excusing “The Monk” from playing and enabling Sanchez instead to compete in the anticlimactic finals.

More interesting is the film’s ending – an overt reference to The Color of Money (or maybe Rocky III) in which Barro and “The Monk,” both now with clean consciences, can compete one more time to see who is the real best 5-pins player.

Since Il tocco – la sfida is not available to buy or stream, I am extremely grateful to Mr. Coletti for directly sending me a copy of the movie (in English, too!).