One Paragraph Movie Review: Cool Hand Luke

Eighty-eighth film: Cool Hand Luke. My my my my MY what a good picture. Good looking Paul Newman and his nipples! Hard sweaty work! Harry Dean Stanton! Trapper John from M*A*S*H! The dad from The Waltons! The mean dad from Girls Just Want To Have Fun! This is an extremely manly film indeed, what with the prison and the chain gang and the fist fights and the eating competitions and whatnot. That said, it kind of mocks masculinity for masculinity’s sake, and the whole movie is dripping with that kind of thing. For just about every brazen display of pointless machismo there is a corresponding hardship-shaped rebuttal, making each new display seem more and more pointless. Also, now I very surprisingly feel like eating a lot of hard-boiled eggs. Loved it. LOVED IT. Four and three-quarter gratuitously sexy car washes out of five.