Honestly one of my favorite movies going way back. However, I just watched it again and remembered something that's always bothered me... After Redford agrees to sell out Newman, he starts acting really quiet and moody, like he's hiding something. Is that just a way to set the audience going down the wrong path? Is it a cheat?
"There is one more thing. It's been emotional."
I think he was genuinely nervous about the "sting" going down all right. When we see him sitting in Henry Gondorf's room, it was getting very close to showtime.
Push the button, Max!
In reality he was nervous about the sting going down but the filmakers also wanted us to think the FBI agents were real
Oh GOOD!,my dog found the chainsaw
I agree, we misinterpret his anxiety because we think the Feds are real. After the fact, it is like "oh, he wasn't nervous about the feds, he was nervous about the sting."
Push the button, Max!
mate do u really need that explained ?!! he was just feeling a bit edgy about what was coming up and obv to throw the audience a curve ball !
shareYou are absolutely correct. it was just a device to mislead the audience.
shareJoplin's pensive "Solace" always comes to mind when I reflect on that particular scene. It was the ideal background piece. Sure, Hooker was edgy about the sting going over, but I think a deeper conflict within him was also apparent. The loss of Luther was huge for Hooker, and, as Gondorff explained, even the money taken from Lonigan was not going to compensate for it. I could sense the isolation Hooker felt when he went out and met up with "the woman from the diner" hoping to somehow fill the deficit. "You know me, it's two o'clock in the morning, and I don't know nobody". Darn, I can't get that song out of my head now!
He who conquers himself is mightier than he who conquers a city.
Well said, jwalsh67. Solace is a wonderful song. As someone who has played all of the songs from "The Sting" on the piano over the years, I still get a special thrill whenever I play that song. Compared to the more complex Joplin rags (which are also great), Solace is a lot easier to play so I can better get into the "mood" when I play it.
As you probably know, Solace was part of the scene the night before the Big Con, so I have always associated that song with going to sleep the night before something "big" happening the next day.
Now I can't get that song out of my head, either!
Hey, Scrabbler! A fine pianist you must be to cover all of those Joplin pieces. I'm assuming that includes the magnificent, yet difficult, "Maple Leaf Rag". I have attached a link to a song I composed as a tribute to Joplin and, somewhat, to Marvin Hamlisch too. If you have any similar videos to share, please do--I'd love to hear them!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73n-GpqzEAg
He who conquers himself is mightier than he who conquers a city.
Jwalsh67, I have not played the piano in several years. But when I was at the top of my game, I could belt out those Joplin pieces rather well. And that included, of coure, "Maple Leaf Rag," once I bought the sheet music to it 30 years ago. It was a pretty tough song to finally nail down.
While most of the Joplin songs I have played over the years are in "The Sting," there are a few others besides those I played. My dad in the early 1970s bought an album of Joplin piano rags played by Joshua Rifkin which includes a few non-Sting songs including Maple Leaf Rag.
But it was another non-rag I played back in the 1990s which was a great piece by Joplin. It is called "Bethena," a rare waltz Joplin wrote just over 100 years ago. It is not very tough to play and it a wonderful, touching song. Another thing I did in the 1990s for my grandfather was to create a medley of my favorite sections of the many Joplin rags I played.
I am sorry to say I do not have any videos to post.
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He's just generally nervous over the con. But we as the viewers are supposed to interpret it at that point as him being agonized over selling out Gondorf.
"Unless Alpert's covered in bacon grease, I don't think Hugo can track anything."
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It's foreshadowing. The director and writer are subtly suggesting to the audience causing it to try to figure out what is bothering Redford. Considering what Hooker's life has become and why do you think he felt more troubled at this point in the story? (I just gave you an assignment. :-) )
shareAs others have said, Hooker is just nervous about the con. It is after all a lot more complex than anything he's done before. And it's more complex than the viewer is supposed to realise at that point (we don't know that the FBI guys are part of it), which is why it's easy for us to misinterpret his nerves. The beauty of it is that straight after the scene where he pretends to agree to sell gondorff out, the latter asks him what's up and he says he's 'just jumpy, that's all'. He's telling the truth, but the nature of the film is such that it hardly occurs to the first time viewer that there *isn't* something else going on.
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