Cool Hand LukeThe Eighth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States prohibits, among other things, "cruel and unusual punishment". For a rebel like Lucas "Luke" Jackson (Paul Newman), with freedom running through his blood, what could be more cruel than imprisonment itself? Following an incident of felonious vandalism, Luke is taken to work on a chain gang lorded over by a patronizing, weaselly little man known only as "the Captain" (Strother Martin). After establishing himself as an indomitable spirit, earning the respect of the unofficial leader of the prisoners, a hulking man called "Dragline" (George Kennedy), Luke swiftly becomes a source of inspiration for the prisoners, and as a result, a threat to the order of the system confining him.
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Luke is a man who seems to be at odds with everything, paradoxically by his apparent ambivalence. From the start of his time at the prison, he doesn't fall for the bait dangled by men like Dragline, and keeps largely to himself until an incident where Luke tells Dragline to politely put a cork in it after he goes on reminding them about a pretty girl (Joy Harmon) washing her car earlier in the day. The ensuing boxing match is the first sign the prisoners have as to what kind of man Luke is, and more, what they are looking for in their hunger for faith and hope. Luke refuses to stay down, even though it's clear he has no delusions about overcoming Dragline--it's not important if he wins, so long as he has a say in not counting himself out. This "never say die" attitude is what is missing in the tyrannical regime at the prison, where the men are so micromanaged that they must announce when they take off their shirt. Luke is a reluctant hero; there's not even the sense that he wants to be one, just that he's fed up with the system pushing him around. In truth, he might have just gone on tolerating his sentence--passing time--for his absurd infraction with an altogether inappropriate sentence. (And seriously, parking meters are stupid. What could be a more arbitrary regulation than paying to park your car?) But the energy Luke stirs in the men by his independent spirit, by his unwillingness to back down to a challenge, and his semi-sarcastic attempts to provoke the bosses makes him a subtle threat, and the collective bosses of the prison know it. They know that activities like tarring a road is meant to break the spirit, to keep the men in check and in line. When Luke prompts them to finish it fast--to stick it to the man--giving them a couple hours of daylight to do nothing, the balance of power is no longer solely in the control of the guards. When Luke's mother--whom he calls Arletta (Jo Van Fleet)--passes away, the Captain takes to the idea of isolating Luke in "the box", a glorified outhouse. As the box is generally reserved for infractions of regulation, it is a spiteful punishment, done solely to keep him in line--in the right mind--by the paranoid Captain, and is thus "cruel and unusual". This is the real gauntlet thrown down, the last straw for Luke, who knows that he can no longer tolerate a place which is so consumed by bureaucratic tyranny, great or small; running was inevitable.
The Captain observes that Luke fought in the war, ascending to the rank of sergeant, but leaving the same rank he came in, a private. Luke later talks of how he considers himself a sinner for killing in the war, and it becomes clear that this was the real turning point for him, where the aimless, shifting Luke understood the senselessness of the world. The smirk which dominates his face is like that of someone who is the only one who gets a joke; but it's a cynical one, knowing that the joke is the world. What message Luke has obtained is not an enlightening one, but one which befuddles. Just as we see the petty restrictions imposed by the prison to keep them docile and controllable, the echoes of this control system can be felt all around us in the world we shuffle through day after day. Luke's rebellion swells with time; it comes from the sense that the world is an abjectly unfair place, a realm where nothing makes sense. Luke is an intelligent man, even though the reason for his incarceration seems silly. He is also a fighter, who has tried so many things in his life, trying to find his path, and constantly coming up disappointed. He is a man who is looking to discover his calling, only everyone else is speaking a different language. All he sees are people who are looking to climb a little higher up the mountain, willing to use others as stepping stones. To Luke, the very idea of this world is a sad and frustrating one, like there's no answer at all. When Luke escapes to an abandoned church, he calls out "anybody here"; he's not just talking about people. When confronted by one of the bosses, he implies he doesn't believe in God. The Captain's dedicated effort to break his spirit following his second escape recalls an old saying about there being no such thing as an atheist in the trenches, literally in this case, as he is consigned to keep digging the same pointless ditch over and over. There's not so much the sense that Luke doesn't believe in God, only that he doesn't much appreciate a father figure--he calls God "old man"--who like his dad, split before he even knew him. For all his seeming bravery, Luke is also self-destructive; even when his comrades try to support him--like when they spoon up the excess food laid out on his plate by a vengeful hound wrangler called "Dog Boy" (Anthony Zerbe)--he is determined to push until he is destroyed. Luke feels that for all his efforts to try at so many different paths in life, he has somehow disappointed his mother, and that no amount of penance will be enough to atone for his sins; he must sacrifice himself for his life to have any meaning.
The dynamic of the prison is not at all different than that of the Antebellum South; the prisoners are treated no differently than slaves. Even Dragline, who is essentially an "unofficial boss" or "Uncle Tom", speaks of the bosses as "free men", and uses language and behaviors reminiscent of portrayals of slaves in other films. The prisoners even sing spirituals to keep their hopes up, like when they see the persecution Luke is forced to endure. There has been much said about the Christ-like analogy in Cool Hand Luke. It's true that Luke inspires hope in the prisoners, even incidentally, by virtue of his behavior and how he lives his life. He is willing to suffer torments to ennoble those who have faith in him, bolstered by his first apostle, Dragline. The bosses are essentially the Pharisees in this dynamic, petty tyrants who see Luke as a threat to their power, and use drastic means to break him and prevent his message from blossoming, but by their scorn, they also stoke the flames of his legend. Smaller details imply this relationship, from the aftermath of the egg eating contest, where Luke is laid out unmistakably like Jesus on the cross. His tearful performance of "Plastic Jesus" is not a coincidence; even the name implies that Luke is a figure who is worshiped, but he is just a replica, a stand in for something else missing in the lives of the prisoners: deliverance. When Luke is captured again, he is clearly beaten up, and his fervent followers hover around him, looking for more juicy stories of his exploits abroad, after he sent them a photograph of him living the high life. He angrily pushes them away, and observes that they're feeding off him, a comment which also recalls the message of the Eucharist.
Luke is sympathetic and identifiable because we see the absurdity in the severity of his punishment for the crime he committed, and relate to his desire to be free from the wretchedness of his sentence, forced to slave away under the unforgiving hot, southern sun, the wailing of hounds afoot, and the cold, concealed stare behind the reflective sunglasses of the ostensibly eyeless Boss Godfrey (Morgan Woodward). It is easy to see the parallels to the control engine of the Captain in our own lives, from micromanaging bosses at work to manipulative politicians, poisoning our minds with propaganda. Luke's snubs to the bosses come in subtle ways at first; even his fifty eggs he promises to eat is a mirror of the fifty prisoners at the camp, his way of saying to his captors, "I'm going to do this for each and every one of these guys, and you can't stop me". The Captain's unforgettable proclamation about "failure to communicate" is the kind of derisive, banal utterance that would seep out from a bureaucratic tyrant, a petty man who abuses his power, then is so cowardly that he tries to justify it by rhetoric. The real reasons we hate guys like the Captain is because they propose that they are better than us, that they deserve more rights than us, for whatever reason is convenient to them at the time. Our indignation comes from the awareness that this kind of attitude is in direct violation of the idea which makes our nation great, the concept of freedom for everyone. And sometimes you have to fight for it, and sometimes that means sacrifice, even martyrdom.
Recommended for: Fans of a touching and stirring story about freedom and how a system ostensibly designed to make our lives more secure is built upon the foundation of taking away those very freedoms in direct and indirect ways.
The Captain observes that Luke fought in the war, ascending to the rank of sergeant, but leaving the same rank he came in, a private. Luke later talks of how he considers himself a sinner for killing in the war, and it becomes clear that this was the real turning point for him, where the aimless, shifting Luke understood the senselessness of the world. The smirk which dominates his face is like that of someone who is the only one who gets a joke; but it's a cynical one, knowing that the joke is the world. What message Luke has obtained is not an enlightening one, but one which befuddles. Just as we see the petty restrictions imposed by the prison to keep them docile and controllable, the echoes of this control system can be felt all around us in the world we shuffle through day after day. Luke's rebellion swells with time; it comes from the sense that the world is an abjectly unfair place, a realm where nothing makes sense. Luke is an intelligent man, even though the reason for his incarceration seems silly. He is also a fighter, who has tried so many things in his life, trying to find his path, and constantly coming up disappointed. He is a man who is looking to discover his calling, only everyone else is speaking a different language. All he sees are people who are looking to climb a little higher up the mountain, willing to use others as stepping stones. To Luke, the very idea of this world is a sad and frustrating one, like there's no answer at all. When Luke escapes to an abandoned church, he calls out "anybody here"; he's not just talking about people. When confronted by one of the bosses, he implies he doesn't believe in God. The Captain's dedicated effort to break his spirit following his second escape recalls an old saying about there being no such thing as an atheist in the trenches, literally in this case, as he is consigned to keep digging the same pointless ditch over and over. There's not so much the sense that Luke doesn't believe in God, only that he doesn't much appreciate a father figure--he calls God "old man"--who like his dad, split before he even knew him. For all his seeming bravery, Luke is also self-destructive; even when his comrades try to support him--like when they spoon up the excess food laid out on his plate by a vengeful hound wrangler called "Dog Boy" (Anthony Zerbe)--he is determined to push until he is destroyed. Luke feels that for all his efforts to try at so many different paths in life, he has somehow disappointed his mother, and that no amount of penance will be enough to atone for his sins; he must sacrifice himself for his life to have any meaning.
The dynamic of the prison is not at all different than that of the Antebellum South; the prisoners are treated no differently than slaves. Even Dragline, who is essentially an "unofficial boss" or "Uncle Tom", speaks of the bosses as "free men", and uses language and behaviors reminiscent of portrayals of slaves in other films. The prisoners even sing spirituals to keep their hopes up, like when they see the persecution Luke is forced to endure. There has been much said about the Christ-like analogy in Cool Hand Luke. It's true that Luke inspires hope in the prisoners, even incidentally, by virtue of his behavior and how he lives his life. He is willing to suffer torments to ennoble those who have faith in him, bolstered by his first apostle, Dragline. The bosses are essentially the Pharisees in this dynamic, petty tyrants who see Luke as a threat to their power, and use drastic means to break him and prevent his message from blossoming, but by their scorn, they also stoke the flames of his legend. Smaller details imply this relationship, from the aftermath of the egg eating contest, where Luke is laid out unmistakably like Jesus on the cross. His tearful performance of "Plastic Jesus" is not a coincidence; even the name implies that Luke is a figure who is worshiped, but he is just a replica, a stand in for something else missing in the lives of the prisoners: deliverance. When Luke is captured again, he is clearly beaten up, and his fervent followers hover around him, looking for more juicy stories of his exploits abroad, after he sent them a photograph of him living the high life. He angrily pushes them away, and observes that they're feeding off him, a comment which also recalls the message of the Eucharist.
Luke is sympathetic and identifiable because we see the absurdity in the severity of his punishment for the crime he committed, and relate to his desire to be free from the wretchedness of his sentence, forced to slave away under the unforgiving hot, southern sun, the wailing of hounds afoot, and the cold, concealed stare behind the reflective sunglasses of the ostensibly eyeless Boss Godfrey (Morgan Woodward). It is easy to see the parallels to the control engine of the Captain in our own lives, from micromanaging bosses at work to manipulative politicians, poisoning our minds with propaganda. Luke's snubs to the bosses come in subtle ways at first; even his fifty eggs he promises to eat is a mirror of the fifty prisoners at the camp, his way of saying to his captors, "I'm going to do this for each and every one of these guys, and you can't stop me". The Captain's unforgettable proclamation about "failure to communicate" is the kind of derisive, banal utterance that would seep out from a bureaucratic tyrant, a petty man who abuses his power, then is so cowardly that he tries to justify it by rhetoric. The real reasons we hate guys like the Captain is because they propose that they are better than us, that they deserve more rights than us, for whatever reason is convenient to them at the time. Our indignation comes from the awareness that this kind of attitude is in direct violation of the idea which makes our nation great, the concept of freedom for everyone. And sometimes you have to fight for it, and sometimes that means sacrifice, even martyrdom.
Recommended for: Fans of a touching and stirring story about freedom and how a system ostensibly designed to make our lives more secure is built upon the foundation of taking away those very freedoms in direct and indirect ways.