September 2010 Archives

That's what I call a movie sensation: watching Cool Hand Luke, an American classic movie, starring Paul Newman in one of - if not his - best roles, left me all wet and impressed on my couch. The plot in itself is pretty simple: our hero, soon to be called "Cool hand Luke," is sentenced to two years in prison because he was caught dead drunk while cutting the heads off parking meters in his small town. He is sent in a sunny prison camp, somewhere in Georgia, surrounded by hot, topless thugs of all kinds, and working like a slave under the eyes of a sadistic captain - big brother is watching you. In this context, oscillating between gay porn ambiance and concentration camp, Luke gains respect from his mates by the aura of his personality and a series of escapes: after his third escapade, he is finally killed by cops while having a conversation with God in a desolate church.

Luke is not just a social outcast, but he incarnates, well before Edward Scissorhands, a tormented, beautiful prince fallen on earth, lost and confused among the rules and norms of his peers. The symbolic gesture of cutting the heads off parking meters shows his resistance to the logics of discipline and capitalism: but more than a rebel, Luke stands out as an existentialist subject who takes the radical freedom to question the basis of the society he lives in, starting with the faith in God, the duty of obey and fear cops, and the quest for money. Prophet without a revelation, seducer without sexual activity, he only rules with the devastating charm of his smile and the paradoxical strength of his skepticism. In his confrontation with either God ("I guess you're a hard case, too") or the captain ("I wish you'd stop being so nice with me"), just like when he plays poker with his fellows, he expresses the wit of the weak, and makes some point out of his nothingness. In this case, including his tragic end, he reminds us of another enigmatic figure of resistance, Melville's Bartleby.

Luke is a hero of a strange kind: an anti-hero. Although his masculinity is blatant and overwhelming, he does not fit the classic standards of manliness. At the beginning of his stay in the camp, his independence and irony make him engage in a fight against the leader of prisoners, Dragline. The spectator expects him to knock out Dragline out of bravery and violence, but actually Dragline beats the hell out of him: the surprise comes from the fact that Luke, in spite of his inferiority, keeps standing up over and over, receiving more blows and approaching the edge of a black out or a mortal injury. Reluctant to surrender, he impresses so much Dragline by his resistance that, finally, it is Dragline who stops beating him and gets out of the ring. Luke's masculinity is not so much about beating other people than it is about taking it in without fainting - some sort of power bottom, indeed. After this episode, Dragline loves Luke and calls him his baby until his sacrifice for him at the end of the movie.

Women do not matter for Luke, it is pretty clear in an amazing scene of the movie when prisoners leer at a woman washing her car in a very erotic way. All the prisoners enjoy this exhibitionist show and are just about to jerk off in their pants. Only Luke remains quiet and comments that she's pretending to look innocent, but that she is actually enjoying every minute of her performance. Likewise, during his second escape from the camp, Luke sends Dragline a magazine in which he appears on a page surrounded by two beautiful women. When he is caught by the cops and brought back to prison, the prisoners are all excited about asking him about these girls, but he tells me the picture was a phony, he only sent it to please them.

Eventually, only one woman matters to Luke, and it is after her death he starts running away from his prison and takes one step further in his opposition to discipline and punishment: this woman is his mother, Arletta, played by Jo Van Fleet. What we have here is maybe a failure to communicate between Luke and Big Brother, but no failure in terms of compassion and emotions: by the end of the movie, Cool hand Luke acquires a charisma that survives him and blesses the audience with a confusing sensation of grace. A masterpiece, indeed.

Here's a taste -- the famous car wash scene: