Winning

EXCELLENT MOVIE !! PAUL NEWMAN AND JOANNE WOODWARD ARE EXCELLENT AS IS
RICHARD "JOHN BOY" THOMAS IN HIS FIRST ROLE. GIVES INSIGHT INTO EARLY
INDY CAR RACING AND ONE OF THE GREAT CRASHES OF THE INDY 500. MUSIC IS ALSO ENJOYABLE.

Some afternoon or evening when you want to watch racing films watch Grand Prix with Jim Garner and this film. If time allows throw in LeMans with Steve McQueen.

The last time I saw this film was 40 years ago, in a theater, but I wanted to add it to my permanent DVD library, both because I've been on a Paul Newman kick lately, and because I'm increasingly interested in films from the late 1960s and early 1970s.

In my view, Winning is an overlooked gem with great performances from Newman and Woodward (always great to watch these two in action together), a mature plot with a credible dramatic setup, and some fantastic racing footage based at the Indianapolis 500. (Check out the wreck that happens just about a minute after the great race begins: it's one of the most frightening things ever captured in cinema. I don't know if this wreck was staged or just happened to be captured on film.)

Great to see Richard Thomas in an early role as a troubled but likable teenager. And here's to Robert Wagner, Newman's arch rival on the track and in the bedroom, who's a villain you almost have to love!

Good work all around. Some of the music soundtrack appears a bit dated with 40 years hindsight, but Winning still wins: it's a great looking film with exciting action and great stars that also serves as a fascinating time capsule of the 1960's car culture.

If you like early racing movies here's another good one. It ranks right up there with Le Mans and Gran Prix. It's a must see!

Newman is a successful driver who marries a small-town divorcée (Joanne Woodward), soon after they've met... As usual, he devotes too much time to his career and ignores everything else, and, as in "From the Terrace," Woodward turns in desperation to another man--here a rival driver (Robert Wagner). Newman finds them in bed, and becomes estranged from her (again, as in "From the Terrace"), but after winning the big race, he realizes his life is empty, and attempts a reconciliation (the theme of the "winner" who's really a loser).

The relationship is superficially written, but Newman and Woodward make us care about it... Their first film together since "A New Kind of Love," it's their best since "The Long Hot Summer." They exude a naturalness, intimacy and spontaneous affection that one suspects come from their own feelings for each other... It is apparent in their first scene, where he is slight1y drunk, delightfully playful, and confident (but no longer unpleasant) in his attempt to pick her up; and she responds with smiles and applause at his tricks with a fireman's hat, but looks slight1y uncertain about this glamorous stranger...

Following their wedding, they sit on a swing, drinking beer from cans, talking and laughing quietly... She describes her previous loneliness, and he responds, typically, "Beer's a lot less complicated." They smile, she rubs his back and leans her head on his shoulder: these are people who really know each other, and who have attained a maturity about themselves...

Newman exhibits this maturity throughout... His loose, casual style, evident in "Cool Hand Luke," has given way to an almost complete mellowness... Perhaps because of the confidence gained from his directing experience, he has gotten rid of his mannerisms; and except for the intense determination he shows while racing, he's more relaxed than ever before... Although the script tells little about his past, there's a wealth of experience etched into his face, especially in his brilliant, silent reaction to finding the couple in bed--one of quiet resignation that suggests a lifetime of pain and frustration...

Newman has many fine scenes of quiet underplaying: his camaraderie with Wagner early in the film; his solitude after the race; his genuine warmth in the relationship with his stepson (Richard Thomas). The scenes in which they drink champagne and come home drunk together project for the first time in Newman's career a really paternal feeling--only vaguely suggested in strikingly similar scenes in "Hud."