The Cincinnati Kid DVD (1 Viewer)

[Robert Crawford]

Kudos to Warner for another fine job with this dvd. The run time on this dvd is about 25 seconds shy of 103 minutes. There has always been a discrepancy about the length of The Cincinnati Kid. Some films books and even AFI's site list the run time as 113 minutes, but I've never seen a version of this film that long and the director, Norman Jewison never mentioned the film being that long. He did confirmed that his preference for the ending would be the shot of McQueen's face after losing the coin toss to the shoeshine boy while the studio and producer insisted on McQueen after the coin toss, walking around the corner of the building where he runs into Tuesday Weld, who then hugs him followed by the end credits. On this dvd the ending is the one with the happy ending and of course, it's still a sore spot for Jewison who prefer The Kid losing everything including the girl.

Also, the infamous fight is on this dvd too.

Anyhow, what a great job of film editing by Hal Ashby, who of course, when on to a distinguished directing career. The writing by Ring Lardner Jr. and Terry Southern was perfect. I simply loved this cast, particularly, the supporting players like Joan Blondell, Karl Malden, Rip Torn, Ann Margret, Jack Weston and the great Edward G. Robinson. What a performance by Edward G. and McQueen wasn't bad himself.

I'm still in the middle of watching this dvd again with the commentary and there are two different commentaries on this dvd. One features Jewison and the other has the hosts of Celebrity Poker Showdown.








Crawdaddy

 

[Haggai]

I've also watched the movie and the Jewison commentary on this disc. Edward G. really was great, and Ann-Margret was SO HOT in her role, one of my absolute favorite "bad girl" characters in any movie. The poker game showdown finale is extraordinarily well done--even though I still think the movie meanders a bit too much in the first half (I first saw it on TV a few years ago), I was stunned all over again by how effective the climax is.

Regarding Jewison's thoughts on the ending:

I think his instincts were wrong, and the producers were right. Jewison is right to point out that the non-"Hollywood ending" result of The Kid losing the big game is very powerful, but having the movie end on a shot that would essentially say "life sucks, you lost" would have been too much for the story to bear. It's more fun and breezy entertainment than a really serious character study, so a complete downer of an ending would have come across as being pretentious. Reuniting him with Tuesday adds this lovely bittersweet touch that fits the movie just perfectly. The only question is one of logic: had she been standing out there waiting for him the whole time, after she walked out when she caught him in the hotel room with Melba, which might have been almost twelve hours earlier?!

Another nice touch that I had missed the first time I saw the movie: the final credits scroll over the poker table with the two hands from the final game, The Kid's and Lancey's, still sitting there!