Review of Cool Hand Luke (1967) by Steven S — 08 Feb 2010

Rebels are people who don't want to listen to the man. They are the anti-heros of society that send out messages to audiences and people around the world about what is right and what is wrong. This is a perfect example of that.

"Cool Hand Luke" is a prison drama about fighting the machine and keeping your own dignity. It's great to know that they got Paul Newman to play the lead character in this one because he plays his part just right.

He plays Lucas Jackson, a man who tends to be bored with what he has been living with lately. The movie begins with him being under the influence, unscrewing the heads off of parking meters. He gets arrested and sent to a type of prison you don't expect to be the best of places.

The prison he is sent to seems to have a high set of ground rules, from keeping your sheets clean, keeping a good distance of where you are in the prison, the proper stance of smoking, and no back sass to the "boss.

" If none of the rules are followed correctly, each prisoner gets to spend the night in the box. This is all made perfectly clear upon Lukes arrival after getting to know who will be watching over him while he is there.

There are a variety of prisoners here who aren't exactly ruthless, they can actually be some pretty nice people. The one that everyone follows is named Dragline (George Kennedy). Dragline controls what the prisoners do around the place, and he makes sure everything goes around his way.

Luke however doesn't exactly agree with what this prison has to offer him. He views what the guards do to most of the prisoners, mainly treating them all like crap, like useless little babies. Luke can't take it anymore, especially after hearing about the death of his mother, being unable to attend the funeral of her.

Do the boss's know how to help deal with a prisoner unable to attend a funeral? Why, of course they do. They simply put them in the box. Take note, the box is supposed to be a place to help prisoners think about what they've done to get their minds back on track.

The box sure didn't help Luke much. He's sick of the prison, so what does he do? He plans to escape. With his first attempt to escape, his punishment is being all chained up around his legs. Here comes the best scene and one of the greatest quotes of all time on screen.

The captain explains how the chains will do him good, and then Luke compliments him in a sarcastic way. The captain (Strother Martin) gets so frustrated, he whacks him upside the head, pushing him down on the ground.

He then says "What we've got here is...failure to communicate." This is beyond one of the greatest lines ever spoken in a movie. It's a line that is meant to be paid attention by society and what it can become if some people don't want to listen to the man.

But Luke makes a point. That's his purpose in the movie. He doesn't want to listen to someone whose going to be making crappy rules that no one really wants to follow because they aren't fair in his book.

After viewing his many escapes from prison, he becomes a symbol for all the prisoners in the place, almost as if an angel from Heaven has landed to help guide this men to some type of guided light to make sure that they aren't depressed with thier lives.

This movie is Paul Newman gold with his portrayel of Luke. He lives up the title character playing it cool and awesome. Another performance is by the oscar-winning portrayel of Dragline by George Kennedy, and another great performance by Strother Martin and Jo Van Fleet as Arletta.

This is a movie that will go down in history as the ultimate film that will keep its own opinion on how people should act in society.