Review of Poolhall Junkies (2002) by George L — 02 Mar 2010

If you didn't like Rounders, stop reading now because you won't like Poolhall Junkies. This is a movie made for an audience that wants to look through the keyhole and see a world on the other side that is fun to imagine but never visit.

Poolhall Junkies is a very entertaining film if you can accept the characters for who they are. The cast is a grouping of fairly one-dimensional archetypes that help illuminate the multi-dimensionality of the main character Brad. The story is fairly predictable, but that's not really what you watch this movie for. You watch it for the dialogue and the situation.

The dialogue is very fun, and the main character Brad is the kind of poolshark we all wish we could be. He's a tragic hero who could be the best if he could just get out of the world he's made for himself. Luckily for him, Christopher Walken (Uncle Mike) just so happens to take a liking to him. This is pretty fortunate for the audience too because Walken sells his character beautifully. No actor can play a sheep and a wolf at the same time so very well, and that is the exact trait needed in a master hustler.

Poolhall Junkes is the kind of movie that you'll quote with your friends when you're feeling cocky during a game of pool, or even when you're just bullsh*tting around a diner table. And I'll say it right now; it's not as good as Rounders. It doesn't take itself as seriously, but that's ok.

I give the movie an 8/10 because it delivers on what it was trying to deliver, a fun story about pool hustling coupled with quotable lines. Simple as that.