My chief complaint is that there are no captions, so I'm only catching bits and pieces of the movie. The names are already killing me. Jezebel... Jericho... Is this pool or 'Children of the Corn'?
The acting as a whole was atrocious. Was there even a director on the set? The accents and dialogue are hilarious. All I hear is "sisal, sisal, sisal". I have never in my life heard anyone talk like this in any pool hall I've ever been in. The special features said the slang was 30% made up by the movie makers - try 90% and the rest they got wrong. Like what is all this "tribe" talk? Nice tattoos, by the way. So they get branded. With eight-balls, no less. Way to hustle there, sports. I expect to hear Ving Rhames offer to get the horses for his "mastuh" any minute now. Oh, Freddie... if you're lyin, you're dyin? That's tough. Especially with you lowering your voice like that. It's reminiscent of Rocky Balboa.
Then not only did they make up their own jargon, they butchered actual pool terminology. It's a good thing this movie never made it to theatres, or we'd have a bunch of clowns running around our pool halls rambling about dandelions and lemons.
Of course, the shots, the bridges, and the "sharking" these guys are doing are all horrible, but I expected no less. The rack twirl got me, though. You know what I'm talking about... That thing ball-bangers do. I also noticed when "Jericho" and "Cueball Carl" (*rolls eyes*) are playing, they rack the balls in numerical order. Nice. And love the glove, Carl.
Shooting Gallery was also an apt title. I think they shot more with guns than cues. I actually felt like I was watching a soft porn through some of those scenes.
Not all is lost, though. I walked away with a new playing strategy: When on the nine, hit it as hard as you can. And cuss. A lot.
This movie does what I never thought possible, which is suck more than 'Poolhall Junkies'.
