MITCHELL'S TAKE MITCHELL: Paul Newman And the Best Pro Wrestling Movie Ever Sep 30, 2008 - 5:08:14 PM

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As you may have heard, Oscar winning actor Paul Newman died last weekend at the age of 83.

The guy was, in the best sense of the words, a movie star. He had the star thing, a lot of it, and the most famous blue eyes in the world, but he was smart, and he could act. You got everything movies were capable of in a big Paul Newman movie.

Some of us marked milestones by Paul Newman pictures.

The first, and only, M rated movie I ever was "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," one of his two great collaborations with Robert Redford, in the movie theater. Why was it rated M, you ask? What is M, you ask?

Well, before there was PG-13, (you know, like WWE programming is now without all the blood), or R (like those WWE-produced movies nobody goes to see), or X (like those Candice Michelle movies on Skinemax would be with better editing) ratings there was the M rating. M stood for Mature, but it might as well have stood for Milestone for me because when Elizabeth Ross started taking off her clothes in that dimly lit room and didn't stop, well it was a Milestone for me.

You remember Elizabeth Ross, right? She was a big star there for a few years. She married Sam Elliott, who was kind of a star there for a while, and then turned into a respected character actor. Jake Roberts got a rub from Sam Elliott early in his career, because he looked and sounded so much like him.

Elliott aged into a silver-haired Paul Newman type. Jake Roberts aged into a consistent disappointment.

If you never say Newman in any of his signature roles, from Hud to The Hustler to Cool Hand Luke, or the underrated Nobody's Fool, but not the overrated Color of Money, well, you should. He's great.

If you're a wrestling fan, though, you may not realize that Paul Newman starred in the best pro wrestling movie ever, a movie that Sports Illustrated, ESPN.com, and the Sporting News all called "one of the top ten sports movies ever."

The best pro wrestling movie ever, better than "Beyond The Mat" (speaking of Jake the Snake), or "All The Marbles" (Columbo manages girl wrestlers), "Alias the Champ" (Gorgeous George)," Ready To Rumble" (Diamond Dallas Page - didn't see it), "Wrestling With Shadows" (Bret Hart – actually that was pretty good), or that one with Mike Mazurski that's supposed to be a great black and white noir film that I can't remember the name of and never saw, is Paul Newman in George Roy Hill's "Slap Shot."

I know what you're thinking. "Slap Shot" is a great sports movie, and really funny, only it's not about pro wrestling, it's about minor league hockey.

Well, it is about minor league hockey, but Newman's Chiefs are also every fading territory, grasping-at-straws indy promotion hanging on for that one last shrinking pay check. There's the fading veteran star/coach, Newman, who knows how it is supposed to be, and enjoys what a farce it is now. Newman keeps the big money deal carrot in front of his young stars, all the while knowing the team is too small-time to survive another six weeks. He can't let go.

There's the ex-wife, who sees through all the drugs, drinking, and life on the road bullshit, except she can't quite give it up either.

There's the owner, who just sees the team and the players as financial pawns.

There's the rats. They get older and sadder.

There's the hack's hack play-by-play guy, who hypes everything the team with every half-remembered cliché in the sports history.

There's the fans. They're never satisfied.

Then there's the bespectacled Hanson Brothers, who use aluminum foil to tape up their fists. They're the bottom feeders of the sports, goons who don't know how to do anything but brawl.

The Hanson Brothers, of course, are so pro wrestling that fifteen years later, they "inspired" ECW's Paul Heyman to create the Dudleys, the four eyed family that became the most successful tag-team and garbage wrestling act of their generation. The Hanson Brothers themselves have made a living the last thirty years touring the sports memorabilia shows, the mainstream equivalent of the nostalgia wrestling circuit. They make a good deal more at it than the Midnight Express do, too.

In the end Paul Newman, the team's longtime star, ends up with nothing.

If only ECW or Smoky Mountain or Central States or Memphis had seen things at the end for what they were the way Michael Ontkean's young star character did. In the final scene, when he stripped off his uniform and skated naked in circles in the middle of the big fight – to the delight of all the fans.

Listen to Bruce Mitchell and Wade Keller discuss current events, historical events, wrestling's biggest names, and answer listener questions every weekend for around two hours on the Bruce Mitchell Audio Show at PWTorch.com/members in the Audio Show section. Email: bmitchell51@triad.rr.com.

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