By the time the movie's over, you're kind of hoping that Moses Pray and his young ward Addie are really a father and daughter team. The story keeps the relationship intentionally ambiguous and leaves it to the viewer's imagination, but if you're like me, you probably wind up rooting for it to be true. Addie (Tatum O'Neal) turns out to be a consummate hustler who one-ups 'Moze' more than once, from her off the cuff Bible pricing to breaking up his road romance with Miss Trixie Delight (Madeline Kahn). But the elder O'Neal is no slouch in the con game himself, as his whiskey scam and wrasslin' match maneuver clearly show. This is another of those Seventies flicks that I saw when it first came out, and not again until some forty plus years later, and it still holds up well as an entertaining picture. In my case, it helps that it was done in glorious black and white, just like director Peter Bogdanovich's masterpiece (in my opinion), "The Last Picture Show". If you consider the story in it's entirety, it's a nicely developed caper and heist movie which compares favorably with another 1973 film, "The Sting". Picture if you will Redford and Newman in a double team up with the two O'Neals and you've got the makings for a con with a sure fire blow-off. I'd even pay double to see that one.
Review of Paper Moon
