THE STING

title: THE STING
year: 1973
cast: Robert Redford, Paul Newman, Robert Shaw

rating: ***1/2

Not so much a Robert Redford/Paul Newman team-up, but a Redford vehicle with some Newman on the side, pitting a gang of likable shysters against monopolizing mobster Robert Shaw, who’s responsible for many deaths: including Redford’s former small-time partner. So with the help of Newman as an alky gambler, they devise a sting involving a card game and "rigged" horse races. The direction flows, the acting is good, but what really works are the depression-era sets and the jazzy Scott Joplin score, making the somewhat implausible con, and the clever yet cop-out twist ending, not matter.