The Sting ***** (1973, Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Robert Shaw) – Classic Movie Review 790

Director George Roy Hill’s 1973 gem showcases 70s superstars Paul Newman and Robert Redford at their most charismatic in this delicious caper movie set in Thirties Chicago. It is a worthy follow-up to their first hit together, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), with the stars more or less reprising their performances but in different guise.

Robert Shaw plays Doyle Lonnegan, the tough Irish mob boss and gambler the conmen heroes Henry Gondorff (Newman) and Johnny Hooker (Redford) try to outsmart in a bravura betting-shop ‘sting’ they elaborately set up to take revenge for him murdering their friend, Redford’s old partner.

The film is deliberately and effortlessly breezy and lightweight, like the Ocean’s Eleven trilogy that owes so much to it. But it is also tense, funny and compelling, as the story unfolds with several unexpected twists. And The Sting overflows with charm, thanks to the delightful turns by the twinkling stars, the engaging performances from charismatic support actors Charles Durning, Ray Walston, Eileen Brennan and Harold Gould, David S Ward’s witty screenplay, Robert Surtees’s sparkling cinematography and production designer Henry Bumstead’s gorgeous period production.

Cementing the glossy, gift-wrapped package together is Marvin Hamlisch’s gloriously catchy Oscar-winning arrangement of Scott Joplin’s ragtime tunes, especially the hummable famous vintage tune The Entertainer. That’s quite a package!

The Sting was a box-office sensation and a huge money-spinner. It cost $5,500,000 and took $160 million at the US box office. And it was another sensation on Academy Awards night, as the winner of seven Oscars, including best film, direction, story & screenplay, art direction-set decoration, costume design (Edith Head), editing (William Reynolds), score (Hamlisch).

Now it is a timeless movie classic to enjoy every time it is on TV.

It was Head’s eighth and final Best Costume Design Oscar. Accepting it, she said: ‘Just imagine dressing the two handsomest men in the world and then getting this.’

Ward got the idea for The Sting when he was working on the script for Steelyard Blues (1973). Researching a pickpocketing scene for this, Ward started reading about con artists. He based the story on the real-life exploits of grifter brothers Charley and Fred Gondorff, who planned a scam similar to the one shown in the film, known in 1914 as ‘the wire’ or ‘the big store’. They ended up in Sing Sing but were released and still planning stings in their sixties in the mid-1920s.

The Sting 2 followed belatedly in 1983 but without Newman and Redford.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 790

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