Hustling (1975 TV Movie) User Reviews

Street Life

[sol1218 · 7/10 · 15 December 2003]

******SPOILERS****** Lee Remick, Fran Morrison, plays a hard nose crusading reporter who drives a hard pen & pencil to get to the bottom of the prostitution racket in NYC by exposing those on the top who are untouchable by the police, press and politicians until she takes them on.

One night going out with the police to get a story about the seedy side of the city on a "hooker sweep" the police round up a number of prostitutes. At the police station Fran becomes interested in one of the hookers Wanda, Jill Clayburgh, and pays her bail to get her out of jail. Wanda grateful for what Fran did tells her that she'll repay her for what she did as soon as she turned enough tricks to make up for the $500.00 bail that Fran paid for her. But Fran tells Wanda that she just wants her to tell her everything that she knows about the life that she leads so she can write a story in her magazine, City Magazine, about it.

At first Wanda hit's it right off with Fran in telling her about her hard life and how she has to work to pay off her pimp for food clothing and protection and that she makes something like $20-25,000.00 a year, this is in 1975. But Fran is shocked that Wanda didn't even have $500.00 to bail herself out of jail with all that money that she makes on the streets. When Wanda's pimp, Sweets, finds out that she's talking to a reporter and also starting to think about getting out of the prostitution business and feels that he might lose her from working for him he has a couple of street thugs beat and cut her up so bad that she would get back into line.

Fran feeling responsible for what happened to Wanda takes it upon herself to expose the prostitution business and those who profit the most from it. The makers and shakers from the city and state government as well as the big real estate interests who own the hotels where the hookers do their trade.

Back on the streets Wanda's fellow prostitute as well as best friend Dee Dee, Melanie Mayron, who is 18 but looks like she's in her 40's, has been missing since her one year old son was taken away from her by the social services because they say that she can't provide for him. Fran going to where Dee Dee and Wanda hung out when they wanted to get out of the cold and rain in a deserted construction site and finds Dee Dee dead, she killed herself by slashing her wrists.

With Dee Dee having no one and slated to be buried in Potter's Field Fran comes to the rescue and pays for her to get a proper burial where Wanda and all those from the streets who knew her were in attendance. Also there was Wanda's pimp, Sweets, waiting in the background for her to join him in his pimp-mobile. Wanda to her credit ignored him as he angrily sped away.

In the final scene in the movie we see Wanda waiting for a bus to take her to the airport for a plane to Cleveland to move in with and take care of her old and sick father. Fran says good by and tells Wanda that she has something for her to read during that long plane trip. As a goodbye present Fran takes out the new copy of City Magazine. In it there's the story that Fran wrote about Wanda and the women and girls who work the streets of NYC; also in the article is Fran's exposer of those in high places who shamelessly profit off them. With Wanda on the Bus and then Fran on her way to flag down a cab to take her home she sees that at the local newspaper stand everybody snapping up and buying the magazine with the article about the prostitution racket, that she wrote about, on the front cover.

There's nothing earthshaking about "Hustling" but it's just a good and well intended film. With a young Jill Clayburgh in one of her first movie roles before she hit it big in Hollywood and portrayed women who were, well spoken and educated and classy, but anything then what she played in "Hustling".

Made for TV Melodrama

[MetalGeek · 5/10 · 29 July 2010]

"Hustling" was made for TV in 1975, back when "Movies of the Week" were more of an "Event" and were taken more seriously than they are today. I'd be willing to bet that whatever network first aired this film, probably preceded it with ads saying that it was "Ripped from the headlines" or "The Shocking True Story..." It obviously worked, as I understand the film won several Emmy Awards. 35 years after the fact, "Hustling" is still a decent, although a bit dry, melodrama.

Considering that I found this film on a budget-priced DVD collection called "GREAT BAD GIRL MOVIES," I was hoping for something a little more sleazy/exploitative than what I got. No such luck. "Hustling" turned out to be a pretty straightforward drama, with the basic message being "Hey, prostitutes are people too, man." Lee Remick (pre-"The Omen") stars as a reporter for a major New York magazine who wants to write an expose on the prostitution problem in the Times Square area, which at the time was reaching critical mass. She befriends a reluctant veteran hooker named Wanda (Jill Clayburgh, whose Noo Yawk accent is so thick you can cut it with a steak knife) and uses her as her 'source' for the article, which causes problems for Wanda not only with the other "girls" but with her pimp, who doesn't want her discussing "the business" with an outsider. Of course, since this is a made for TV film the language and action are mostly squeaky clean. The most suggestive dialogue you'll hear is a "prostie" suggesting to a john that he take "two girls" instead of just one, and the only violence is implied or happens offscreen. The upbeat ending is unrealistic and feels as if it were tacked on at the last minute. If this movie were made today, it would probably air on the Lifetime Channel and it would star Alyssa Milano as the reporter and Jennifer Love Hewitt as Wanda. (Y'know what? Now that I think about it, I'd watch that. Haha.)

So while "Hustling" was not exactly what I expected, it was still worth a look,, mainly for the way-cool shot-on-location scenes in the mean streets of New York City circa 1975. The city was a lot dirtier and scarier than it is nowadays. It's also fun to play "spot the character actor" with the supporting cast; you'll see such dependables as Alex Rocco, Burt Young, and even Howard Hesseman ("WKRP") in small roles. Trivia geeks alert, director Joseph Sargent directed multitudes of other TV movies and mini series throughout the '70s and '80s as well as the occasional theatrical film, including 1987's legendary disaster "Jaws: The Revenge!" If nothing else, "Hustling" is far superior to that famed turkey. Retro movie fans should get a few kicks from this dusty offering.

Cliche-burdened film.

[rsoonsa · 3/10 · 30 July 2002]

This film is based upon Gail Sheehy's pseudo-sociological book dealing with streetwalking prostitution in midtown New York, and features Lee Remick as a middle class magazine journalist who selects one particular harlot named Wanda (Jill Clayburgh) with whom she somewhat bonds in the course of investigating unsavoury real estate dealings involving socially prominent figures who ostensibly benefit from prostitution income. Despite the use of open mikes and harshly grained lighting to bring about a sense of aural and visual realism, the work suffers from a romantic approach to its subject, presenting the prostitutes and local police who arrest them as one reluctantly interlaced family, with the pimps grotesque caricatures, and the direction by Joseph Sargent vying with Jerry Fielding's jazzy score for being the most unimaginative contribution, whereas those real problems associated with this type of vice activity: venereal disease, the deleterious effect upon local business establishments, etc., are barely touched upon, indeed being submerged beneath a flurry of bootless subplots.

"Occupation?" ... "Put down 'secretary'. I'm working for the city."

[moonspinner55 · 3/10 · 8 March 2015]

TV-made adaptation of Gail Sheehy's book about the prostitution-overflow in New York City was considered heady stuff in 1975, but time has turned the picture into trivial camp, complete with 'colorful' dialogue ("How can I bust prostitutes on a typewriter with a broken P?" ... "Try W."). Lee Remick plays that warhorse of clichés: the eager magazine writer hoping to get a juicy inside scoop. She befriends a low-class hooker for the sake of her in-depth piece, but the reporter's ultimate loss of innocence rings false within this too-clean scenario. Jill Clayburgh (in platform heels and talking with an artificial Flatbush twang) would have been far more convincing as an upscale Manhattan call-girl; here, pacing the seedy streets in her mini-skirt and fake-fur jacket, she resembles nothing more than the invasion of Hollywood, U.S.A. Some of the location shooting is well-captured, but the movie is a far cry from the gritty expose it clearly means to be; the phoniness of the characters and in the framework of the plot (de rigueur for television movies) sinks nearly all interest in the subject matter. Sheehy (who did not write the teleplay) did work as a consultant on the picture, which fails to explain Clayburgh's 'respectable' makeover at the finale and the interminable bus station farewell scene, which looks like something out of a Ginger Rogers movie.

I can't believe the rating here or the other reviews

[fritzlangville · 10/10 · 12 September 2023]

This movie is basically The French Connection but instead of narcotics being the centrepiece of the movie , in Hustling ,it's prostitution. Jill Clayburgh gives an outstanding performance as Wanda the high priced hooker. At certain points she resembles Sandra Bullock. The movie is a no holds barred, save perhaps for language, portrait of life on the mean mean streets of NYC at perhaps it's most vile and dangerous time the mid- 70s. Lee Remick is her usual solid , dependable, and beautiful self as the reporter writing an expose on the lives of these desperate, and often abused women. Don't let the rating and other reviews (?) mislead . This is a lost gem of a movie. Gritty, powerful with excellent performances.

Jill is wrong for this role, despite being born in that city.

[fedor8 · 14 March 2023]

Casting Jill Clayburgh as a NY prostitute sounds somewhat absurd in theory, and isn't much better in practice. But back then she wasn't well-known. Normally actresses have a field day playing hookers (I wonder why...), and do it with ease, very well - even the bad actresses. It's as if they were born to play them.

Far from being a bad actress, the beautiful Jill is simply wrong for the role, yet another example that casting is an "art form" that requires brains, something a bunch of film-makers lack. She might have been convincing as a Cincinnati hooker, or a Nevadan prostitute, but that Nu Yoyk accent makes her appear to be going for laughs. Sure, there are smaller elements of humour here too, but it is predominantly a social drama. If you manage to get past Jill doing that silly accent then you can believe her. I couldn't, at least not always.

How realistic is this film? For a TV drama it's realistic, but if you'd compare it to "Serpico", for example, or "Working Girls" (not to be confused with that dumb Griffiths film), then perhaps it isn't particularly.

What I like about it is that the writers made an effort to get acquainted with the NY street scene, rather than just make up an obviously artificial world of prostitution as happens so often on the small and big screens, which would completely defeat the purpose. The ins-and-outs of 70s NY Hookerlandia are pretty well covered.

Another plus is that the outdoor scenes were shot in the 70s, on location, a year before "Taxi Driver" came out. True, TD is much grittier, not to mention stylistically brilliant, but both movies give you the "old NYC" in similar ways: the one that punks, pimps, muggers, hipsters, lunatics and liberals still long for, still weep over, because they claim "it was better that way".

Yeah, it was better: but only for "hip" observers, tourists-with-bodyguards, millionaires hidden away in limos, and others wealthy enough to waltz through those areas safe and protected from the reality of such surroundings. They didn't have to live there. When I listen to the likes of Scorsese wax poetic about the "good old days" of muggings and pimps and hookers, I don't know whether to laugh or start a petition to get him locked up in a psychiatric ward. Ditto hipster punks, they too glamourize this era, as if hookers and muggings should be a mainstay of Manhattan life! Laughable. I understand the "romantic" appeal, it's not that I don't, but some people are also enamored with Nazi Germany, but without actually HOPING for a return to that era, without becoming Nazis. They are simply fascinated by that bizarre evil world without actually craving that ideology. Why can't Scorsese and the hipsters do the same?

Another positive is that the plot isn't over-dramatized. There aren't any ridiculous bombastic plot-twists to "create conflict", but things are kept low-key i.e. Mostly realistic, or as much as a TV movie can allow for.

What I didn't like is the stereotypical portrayal of the "idealistic" journalist, doing a story for all the right reasons. Lee Remick's character is pure fiction. American journalists (and journalists in general) are anything but idealist romantics: they are cynical, greedy, over-ambitious careerists who ruin lives at the drop of a hat. Their kind is only one rung above that of defense lawyers and politicians... (It's no coincidence that so many politicians stem from these two dark professions.)

Oh well

[Skylightmovies · 1/10 · 19 March 2022]

Overacting skinny guise selling the life with a barrel of self pity and victimhood thrown in.

The smugly coiffed Remick comes to the rescue of sorts - sell me a story so I can boost my own career as an independent journo. And so the sisterhood feeds on its own.

Somehow the blame is circled back to white men, with the only man that is respected and protected being the black pimp.

The white guys and police who are given sympathetic caring lines are supposed to speak for the audience; offering a way out, asking why put up with this and being shouted down and mocked because ..just because.

We are not allowed to find a solution for these put upon hoes and we have to accept the degradation that these street workers self impose.

The final made over nasal Clayburgh is hysterical as we see the preparation for the 'An Un Married Woman' look . This actor certainly contributed tons to the entitled me me me sell, without female hips and stretch marks and pulling the male actor of the day into bed.

Klute did a better job of selling this fantasy of lost people. Hustling sells it as a career choice.

And as this is the 70's , tv watchers were forced to accept wrong, once again, with sympathy.

Little Ladies of the Night rammed this home with children, as if we didn't get the message enough already, using the teen idol from Starsky and Hutch, David Soul to claim a girly audience .

Don't see too much of this hard sell these days.

What we have now is the masculine harridan , toting AK47's , kicking boxing its way out of a conversation, mocking any man with protective instincts and whining about equality in a Sci fi flick.

Anyway, this is interesting to fast forward through as we pinpoint TV mind control in action and observe the drip drip attempt to destroy womens' self esteem and traditional values.

You want bargains? Try 14th Street!

[mark.waltz · 8/10 · 9 December 2021]

So says streetwalker Jill Clayburgh in her star making role, a TV movie about Street walkers in Times Square in the mid-1970's, focusing on Clayburgh's agreeing to meet with a high-class magazine reporter played by Lee Remick. Lee wants to get the scoop on the financial benefits of prostitution, seeing who makes the profit between the girls, the pimps or the courts. It's not an easy life because they spend more time in the courts then at Rikers then they do "entertaining", and one thing that is very apparent that for most of these ladies, it is a business that is only interfere with when they get caught.

Remick certainly gets an earful, not only from Clayburgh, but from a few other working girls as well, and a few warnings in regards to how the pimps will react. This TV movie is humorous and not at all depressing because it doesn't present it for anything other than it is, not going for shock value or cheap giggles. When Clayburgh and her pal Melanie Mayron pick up a john at the same time, they keep gabbing as the client is undressing, as he is wondering when business will be taken care of. Burt Young adds a bit more realism as the hotel manager freely admitting that he rents by the hour.

It's very mechanical with all parties consenting, and Remick gets to question her own boyfriend, Monte Markham, about his feelings about relations can someone who loves or just a quick financial arrangement. There's even a cross-dressing man among the group when Remick shares her knowledge of Allah with them, and you get to see her character's liberalism as she begins to see a different side of life. Her reaction is certainly a far cry from the matinee ladies on the bus coming from a play who verbally assault Clayburgh as she saunters by.

Coming out the year before "Taxi Driver" and six years after "Midnight Cowboy", this is a long gone view of the crossroads of the world, and you get to see the violence and just respect and harassment, one scene extremely shocking as Clayburgh is assaulted by a gang, later revealed to be a group of women who have turned to a different style of crime, and according to police officer Alex Rocco, probably set up by her pimp. The musical "The Life" showed a different story, but at least Broadway audiences had to make a special trip to a theater to see it. Being a TV movie, this was much more daring, and very well done.

I'm in the Pro House

[barton-company · 9/10 · 21 September 2023]

The characters are gritty and earthy. Jill Clayburgh was desrcibd as having a new York accent so thick you could cut it with a steak knife, and for a debut role she didn't do too badly at all.

So why criticism of her Flatbush dialect I'm not sure, but I know she was from a better part of NYNY. But hey opinions make the world go round.

The scenes are very 1975 so totally amazing to see, nice canvasses of Street life and soem beautiful touches of real people peering back at the camera as it trawls the streets. Oppressive police offices manned by jerks. Aesthetically I felt drawn completely into a compelling seedy and familiar underworld, even if the plot and script was a little watery at times. That's th problem they give Lee Remick I think.

The performance of JC was a taste of things to come, Remick was a little by her best, and all the seedy cops and fleabag hotel managers an pimps play fine roles and from the totally delicious across the decades Beverly Hope Atkinson brings some laughter to the scenes and she really put he stamp on those-when she was given lines to deliver-then in her 30s, still looking about 18. Total romp and immersion, ino a time lost, a very good movie.