Cool Hand Luke

[Byron In Exile]

What the hell, 1960's film.

Nobody gives a damn about slow films like that anymore.

No action, no helicopters blowing up.

But I can eat fifty eggs...

 

[Byron In Exile]

But everyone recognizes, when you say:

What we have here is a failure to communicate

Don't always know what it's from, but they know the line somehow.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

BYRON

The film is a modernized story about prison conditions in Florida circa 1875-1925.

After the Civil War Florida had no prisons. Felons were hanged almost as soon as they were convicted. The Tallahassee paper boasted how Leon County was able to arrest, try, and hang a felon within a week. Justice was dispensed by Federal troops.

When Reconstruction ended, Florida still had no prisons. So the legislature created Prisoner Leases. Capital felonies were still hanged, but lesser felons were leased for labor to railroads, timber companies, mining companies, and agriculture. The contractor paid the state $150 for each man, woman, and child. The youngest felon leased by the state was 4 years old. He 'stole' a horse. He was employed to stack bricks.

I many instances the 'felons' were never convicted of any crime. One Massachusetts girl came to Florida as a tourist and was robbed of her money. Destitute, authorities sentenced her to one year labor at a timber camp for vagrancy. She served her time as a cook at the camp.

About 1900 the camps were authorized to whip inmates who escaped or malingered or created problems. Whipping was outlawed in 1925 after a sick North Dakota youth was whipped to death at a timber camp. He had pneumonia. Convict leasing ended shortly after that.

I'll post a newspaper testimonial about the benefits of whipping convicts.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Salt Lake City TRIBUNE.
13 November 1898.
CONVICT ROAD BUILDING.
Building common roads and railroads with convict labor, says a Brooklynite, is work that is sometimes full of interest and excitement. Efforts are now making on the part of the advocates of road improvement in this State to have convict labor utilized in the construction of a State system of roads, the need of which all New Yorkers recognize. Away down in Florida Mr. Henry Flagler some time ago was building an extension of his East Coast line from Lake Worth to Biscayne Bay. The unskilled labor was performed by convicts supplied by the State.

When the railroad was completed to a point just below Palm Branch, on Lake Worth, a big, brawny six-foot convict made his escape. He disappeared completely, although keepers, assisted by dogs and carrying guns, exhausted every effort to recapture him. Undoubtedly this convict would have made good his escape had he been content to avid the beaten road of travel, but at Palatka he made his appearance, and he tallied with the description telegraphed throughout the State by the keepers. Word was sent to them, and they soon took their man back to Palm Beach. There he was compelled to return to his work after having a ball and chain attached to his legs.

“He was a thoroughly bad man,” said Mr. Mathams, a pineapple planter who lived nearby, “and his face was his misfortune.” At times the convicts who were unresponsive to counseling were whipped, and never after undergoing such punishment has a man attempted to escape. Well, this particular convict was booked for a whipping on his return, and in order to make his whipping sure he went on a strike and refused to do the work cut out for him.

“No man will ever whip me,” he bragged, and again he said, “The man who tries to whip me will get murdered.” Oh! But he was a bad one, and I was afraid the keepers would get the worst of it. They started for him, not a bit dismayed by the threats, and he grabbed the nearest weapon, which luck would have it was a shovel. He aimed a wicked, swinging blow at one of the keepers, and it barely shaved the fellow’s head by a scant inch. Had the blow landed the keeper would not have lived five minutes, as the convict was as strong as a heavyweight boxer. The keepers closed in on him and had him on the ground in a few minutes, although he made a hard fight and was right game, too.

They tied him up to a tree and stroked him with a switch until he stopped cursing. When he was let down he was as gentle as a kitten. With tears in his eyes he promised that he not only would never run away again, but, quite the contrary, would do two men’s work. On the following day I walked over to see the men at work, and there was the big fellow slaving away like a whole team. He was stiff and awkward, however, and I could tell that his bruises hurt him. I sat down on a convenient woodpile to fill my pipe, and as I did so I heard him call out to one of his mates, “ Hey, Bill, will you bring me over the liniment?” and his voice had undergone a wonderful change. Honestly, it was as gentle as a lady’s. All the brag and bluster had gone. One whipping had cured him of all his ugliness.

Convict labor is a good thing, and a whipping when prescribed in an emergency, in my opinion, is not only a wise dose, but is productive of most magnificent results. NEW YORK SUN.

 

[TheeGoatPig]

What the hell, 1960's film.

Nobody gives a damn about slow films like that anymore.

No action, no helicopters blowing up.

But I can eat fifty eggs...

I can't watch that scene...

Great movie though. Yes, it is slow, and no, there isn't any real action, but it is still one fo the best dramas ever done. And in the end, the only thing putting Newman's character into prison and keeping him there was his own damn stupidity. If he had just shut his mouth he would have been in and out of that camp. But no, that was too much for him. What an idiot...

 

[Stella_Omega]

I can't watch that scene...

Great movie though. Yes, it is slow, and no, there isn't any real action, but it is still one fo the best dramas ever done. And in the end, the only thing putting Newman's character into prison and keeping him there was his own damn stupidity. If he had just shut his mouth he would have been in and out of that camp. But no, that was too much for him. What an idiot...

A classical drama, where the hero's flaws bring disaster. I remember being infuriated with "Othello" for stupidly ignoring Desdemona's wise words in favor of iago's evil-- and my drama teacher jumped on it and lectured the class for the whole period. These are morality plays, meant to show what happens when...


Great movie. I watch it about once a year!

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

What the hell, 1960's film.

Nobody gives a damn about slow films like that anymore.

No action, no helicopters blowing up.

But I can eat fifty eggs...

Nobody can eat 50 eggs . . .









(Magnificient movie.)

 

[keeblercrumb]

"Cool Hand Luke" is one of those films which has had an enduring effect on the culture.....

As noted above, the line "What we have here is a failure to communicate"... The eating fifty egg scene....

And I would add the "car wash" scene which has been imitated about a million times since..... Hell.... It is why I like hanging out at the car wash! Sure I like keeping my car clean but.........

-KC

 

[Byron In Exile]

A classical drama, where the hero's flaws bring disaster. I remember being infuriated with "Othello" for stupidly ignoring Desdemona's wise words in favor of iago's evil-- and my drama teacher jumped on it and lectured the class for the whole period. These are morality plays, meant to show what happens when...

Great movie. I watch it about once a year!

You are a better man than me: I watch it every two or three years.

The best part is where Dragline says, "I thought they broke you!" And Luke replies, "Yeah, they broke me."

But yet, he's still what he was before.

So they can break you, but they can't make you stay broken.

I always found that inspiring.

 

[Stella_Omega]

You are a better man than me: I watch it every two or three years.

The best part is where Dragline says, "I thought they broke you!" And Luke replies, "Yeah, they broke me."

But yet, he's still what he was before.

So they can break you, but they can't make you stay broken.

I always found that inspiring.

He was lying-- he bent so easy, he never broke. He had a sense of honor, but no pride...

A great character study, come to think of it!

 

[NoJo]

In a way he was like Jesus Christ (only of course it was Matzos not eggs in Matthew)

 

[Byron In Exile]

He was lying-- he bent so easy, he never broke. He had a sense of honor, but no pride...

A great character study, come to think of it!

I suppose there's some latitude in the definition of "broke." But concepts like honor and pride, at that level, are difficult to give meaning to. He said he had been broken; the character felt that he had been: at the time.

Most people will recover from an experience like that with their behavior permanently modified. They will do whatever is necessary to avoid the risk of being in that situation ever again.

But Luke's spirit was of a sort that would always recover its original form, no matter what was done to it.

Like the captain said, "some people you just can't reach."

Which was a colloquial way of saying that there are some people that the standard behavior-modification techniques don't work on.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

I just watched this - for the first time - yesterday.

Great movie. I never knew where the "failure to communicate" line came from... and didn't even know about the 50 eggs scene.

And I discovered our channel 7 news took their theme music from it!

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

Best movie made in the 60's. Love the idea of cutting the heads off Parking Meters