The Color Of Money (1986) ***

Paul Newman won an Oscar for this film and it was indeed the greatest performance of his career. It's also a typical early Tom Cruise film about a naturally talented kid, guided by a mentor, and encouraged by an older and more mature woman, who has to master a craft in an arena, and acquire a specialized knowledge that will be tested on a trail (kudos to Roger Ebert who masterfully identified all those key elements of the early Tom Cruise pictures in his excellent review of "Days Of Thunder"). But it's actually Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio who steals the movie from her male costars in a superb Oscar-nominated performance. Oh, and it's also a Martin Scorsese film.