On this day in movie history - The Hot Rock (1972 movie & novel):

The Hot Rock

directed by Peter Yates,

written by William Goldman,

based on the novel by Donald E. Westlake,

was released in the United States on January 26, 1972.

Music by Quincy Jones.

Cast:

Robert Redford, George Segal, Ron Leibman, Paul Sand, Moses Gunn, Zero Mostel, William Redfield, Topo Swope, Christopher Guest, Graham Jarvis, Lynne Gordon, Charlotte Rae, Harry Bellaver.

Recommended reading:

The Hot Rock

By Donald E. Westlake.

Book # 1 in the Dortmunder series.

Published by Simon & Schuster.

First published 1970.

First Edition.

Hardcover.

ISBN-10: 0671205412

ISBN-13: 978-0671205416

Description:

John Archibald Dortmunder is the archetypal criminal manque. Brought up in an orphanage in the Midwest, he is 37 years old, served in the "police action" in Korea, was arrested twice for robbery following his release from the service, and was briefly married to a nightclub entertainer named Honeybun Bazoom from whom he was granted an uncontested divorce. For reasons totally beyond his comprehension, Dortmunder is chosen to lead a gang of master hoodlums. Their job: to steal an emerald valued at $500,000. Their employer: Major Patrick Iko, a mustached African diplomat whose country has just lost the gem through a thoughtless political decision. The specialists Dortmunder selects for his impossible mission include: Kelp: an ex-con with a penchant for stealing cars with MD license plates. Stan Murch: a crook who lives with his mother, a cab driver, and collects stereo records of "Sounds of Indianapolis." Roger Chefwick: the railroad nut, a skinny man of late middle age, whose three H-O gauge trains constantly couple and uncouple on H-O gauge track in a waist-high plywood platform in his basement. What follows in this delightful new novel by Donald E. Westlake is an unparalleled mixture of laughter and thrills, featuring a car crash into the New York Coliseum, a free-swinging helicopter attack on a police station, and a wild breakout from an insane asylum on a Tom Thumb locomotive stolen from a nearby amusement park.

On this day in movie history - The Sting (1973):

The Sting

directed by George Roy Hill,

written by David S. Ward,

was released in the United States on December 25, 1973.
Music by Marvin Hamlisch.

Cast:

Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Robert Shaw, Charles Durning, Ray Walston, Eileen Brennan, Harold Gould, John Heffernan, Dana Elcar, Jack Kehoe, Dimitra Arliss, Robert Earl Jones, James Sloyan, Charles Dierkop, Lee Paul, Sally Kirkland, Avon Long, Arch Johnson, Ed Bakey, Brad Sullivan, John Quade, Larry D. Mann, Leonard Barr, Paulene Myers, Joe Tornatore, Jack Collins, Tom Spratley, Kenneth O'Brien, Ken Sansom, Ta-Tanisha, William 'Billy' Benedict, Jack Berle, Nick Borgani, Patricia Bratcher, Robert Brubaker, Robert Buckingham, Peter Eastman, Richard Elmore, Bob Folkerson, Kathleen Freeman, Susan French, Sig Frohlich, Ralph Gambina, Clarke Gordon, Frank Green, Jack Griffin, Bob Harks, George Holmes, Sid Kane, Bruce Kimball, Mike Lally, Alexander Lockwood, Tom McDonough, Jim Michael, Chuck Morrell, Byron Morrow, Richard Niehaus, Jessica Rains, Al Roberts, Edwin Rochelle, Clark Ross, Pearl Shear, Arthur Tovey, Guy Way.

On this day in movie history - The Electric Horseman (1979):

The Electric Horseman

directed by Sydney Pollack,

written by Paul Gaer and Robert Garland,

based on a story by Shelly Burton,

was released in the United States on December 21, 1979.
Music by Dave Grusin.
Songs by Willie Nelson:
My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys.
Midnight Rider.
Mammas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys.
So You Think You're a Cowboy.
Hands on the Wheel.

Cast:

Robert Redford, Jane Fonda, Valerie Perrine, Willie Nelson, John Saxon, Nicolas Coster, Allan Arbus, Wilford Brimley, Will Hare, Basil Hoffman, Timothy Scott, James Sikking, James Kline, Frank Speiser, Quinn K. Redeker, Lois Hamilton, Sarah Harris, Tasha Zemrus, James Novak, Debra L. Maxwell, Michele Heyeden, Robin Timm, Patricia Blair, Gary M. Fox, Richard Perlmutter, Carol Eileen Montgomery, Theresa Ann Dent, Perry Sheehan, Sarge Allen, Sylvie Strause, Richard Knoll, Angelo Giouzelis, Mark Jamison, Brendan Kelly, Sheila B. Wakely, X.V. Kelly, Gary Shermaine, Gary Liddiard, Jerry Kurland, J. Carlton Adair, Charles J. Monahan, George W. Etter, Raymond G. Maupin, Bob C. Barrett, Red McIlvaine, Frank Nicholas, Johnny Magnus, Vic Vallaro, Bob Bailey, Roger Lowe, Kim Kephart, E.P. King, Rita Picking, Bernie Pollack, Sydney Pollack, Tom Willett.

On this day in movie history - The Old Man & the Gun (2018):

The Old Man & the Gun

directed and written by David Lowery,

was released in the United States on September 20, 2018.
Based on the true case of Forrest Tucker (June 23, 1920 – May 29, 2004),

and the article The Old Man and the Gun, published in The New Yorker (2003).

Music by Daniel Hart.

Cast:

Robert Redford, Casey Affleck, Sissy Spacek, Danny Glover, Tom Waits, Tika Sumpter, Ari Elizabeth Johnson, Teagan Johnson, Gene Jones, John David Washington, Barlow Jacobs, Augustine Frizzell, Jennifer Joplin, Lisa DeRoberts, Carter Bratton, Mike Dennis, Tomas Deckaj, Isiah Whitlock Jr., Patrick Newall, Daniel Britt, Leah Roberts, Elisabeth Moss, Alphaeus Green Jr., Keith Carradine, Kevin McClatchy, Todd Covert, Kenneisha Thompson, Robert Longstreet, John Wayne Hunt, Clara Harris, Jordan Trovillion, Derek Snow, Barry Mulholland, Annie Fitzpatrick, J. Todd Anderson, Torie Wiggins, Annell Brodeur, Toby Halbrooks, Christine Dye, Tom Lepera, Warren Bryson, Kelly Mengelkoch, Asher Parran, Kyndra Jefferies, Kay Geiger, Nathan Neorr, Dennis J. Barket, Cody Gilbert, Jack Michael Doke, Alexander M. Partridge, Larry Jack Dotson, Pam Dougherty, Atheena Frizzell, Marissa Woolf, Todd Terry, Sydney Benter, Krzysztof Abbas, Joseph L. Allen, Felicia Andes, Mark Angel, Michael Lee Bailey, Denise Barone, Judy McQueen Bauer, Anita Farmer Bergman, Laurie Bird, Rick Blodgett, John E. Brownlee, Michael W. Bunch, Alejandro Castillo, Austin Caudill, William Cross, Timothy Noah Curtis, Laura Dejean, Bobby Easley, Shawn P. Farrell, Alessandro Ferraris, Reese Foster, Tristan A. Garcia, Sammy Geroulis, Jason Gerrard, Jason Marcus Griffith, Chris Hahn, John W. Harden, Al Harland, Jennifer Henson, Ray Nicholas Hosack, Noah Jonson, Zach Kaltenbach, Susan Kile, Kenneth King, Traci Kochendorfer, Bryan Kruse, Paul Kulis, Daniel Lamont, Daniel J. Le Saint, Art Leung, Anita S Martin, Bryan Massey, Gleedis Mayfield, Joe Merritt, Brianna Moreau, Misty O'Bradovich, Barbara O'Connor, Warren Oates, Tammy Payne, Richard Phillis, David Pittinger, Derek Polen, Charles Poole, Michelle Poole, Aaron Pullins IV, Alec Reeves, Lare Roberts, Steven Schraub, James Siderits, Vince Hobart Smith, Carly Tamborski, Hickory Taylor, Robert P. Thitoff, Skyler Chase Thomas, Tom Vallis, Anthony W. Vickers, Steven Terry Walker, Allen Warchol, Victoria Watkins, Jan Duncan Weir, Dominick Wilkins, Amber Shana Williams.

On this day in movie history - The Natural (1984 movie & novel):

The Natural

directed by Barry Levinson,

written by Roger Towne and Phil Dusenberry,

based on the novel by Bernard Malamud,

was released in the United States on May 11, 1984.
Music by Randy Newman.

Cast:

Robert Redford, Paul Sullivan Jr., Robert Duvall, Glenn Close, Rachel Hall, Kim Basinger, Wilford Brimley, Barbara Hershey, Robert Prosky, Richard Farnsworth, Joe Don Baker, Darren McGavin, Michael Madsen, John Finnegan, Alan Fudge, Ken Grassano, Mike Starr, Mickey Treanor, Jon Van Ness, Anthony J. Ferrara, George Wilkosz, Robert Rich III, Sibby Sisti.

Recommended reading:

The Natural

By Bernard Malamud.

Filmed as The Natural (1984), directed by Barry Levinson.

Paperback.

Published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

First published 1952.

ISBN: 9780374502003

ISBN 10: 0374502005

ASIN: 0374502005

Description:

The Natural, Bernard Malamud's first novel, published in 1952, is also the first – and some would say still the best – novel ever written about baseball. In it, Malamud, usually appreciated for his unerring portrayals of postwar Jewish life, took on very different material – the story of a superbly gifted "natural" at play in the fields of the old daylight baseball era – and invested it with the hardscrabble poetry, at once grand and altogether believable, that runs through all his best work. Four decades later, Alfred Kazin's comment still holds true: "Malamud has done something which – now that he has done it! – looks as if we have been waiting for it all our lives. He has really raised the whole passion and craziness and fanaticism of baseball as a popular spectacle to its ordained place in mythology."