There are tensions that have built between a couple, Brick Pollitt shows contempt, it's far from subtle, his wife Maggie's in despair, she's in love and really cares, but it's fair to say this pairing, is in trouble. Big Daddy joins the party for his birthday, but the whiskey being drunk just goes down one way, secrets hidden and withheld, relationships are hewn and felled, wounds reopened, from a friend, lost through betray. At the climax of this film you'll hold your breath, as the family is overwhelmed, distressed, with performances profound, so much lost and so much found, you will not be disappointed, I attest.

Three of the greatest cinematic performances placed on film.

In "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof," Newman is an ex-football player, trying to relive his college athletic glories… Drinking and staggering, he attempts to jump hurdles, resulting in a painful injury that has him hobbling around on crutches during most of the film…

The role was certainly another demonstration of his widening range, for Brick is in many ways the antithesis of Ben Quick ("The Long, Hot Summer"). Although he too is cynical, cold and guilt-ridden, he manifests it by becoming moody, withdrawn, introverted… In addition, whereas Ben was strong and decisive, causing and participating in events, Brick is weak and passive, largely reacting to events around him... And he's anything but ambitious: while his greedy brother and sister-in-law await Big Daddy's death so they can inherit his huge fortune and plantation, and while his wife Maggie (Elizabeth Taylor) urges him to fight for his share, he merely broods and drinks... An emotionally crippled, "thirty-year-old boy," he refuses to face responsibility and truth, preferring to drown his memories in liquor…

Newman and Taylor enact striking contrasts in temperament: she is fiery, loud, animated, sensual; he is cold, quiet, immobile, dispassionate… Brick and Maggie haven't been sleeping together, and she wants him desperately, but he keeps rejecting her advances… As she talks, he replies with sarcasm, contempt and mostly indifference, speaking in a dreamy, monotonous manner, as if only half-there…

In conversations with her, as with Big Daddy (Burl Ives), he stares into space, or walks away (usually toward the liquor supply), turning his back on the other party and forcing the dialog to take place on separate planes… All of this places him in a private world, where he hides his torment and anxiety beneath a mask of detachment…

If Newman is best at enacting Brick's unspoken thoughts and emotions, he's also effective in the more spirited moments, as when he screams at Maggie or Big Daddy, to prevent them from getting at the truth he wants kept buried… But exactly what the "truth" is remains unclear…

In the play, Brick's fear of admitting a homosexual attachment led indirectly to his friend's death and explained his overall moodiness and passivity… But because of Hollywood's moral code, director-scriptwriter Richard Brooks had to eliminate this, and the character's motivations are considerably weakened… His hostility toward Maggie—understandable in the play—is especially confusing because it results from events that are unconvincingly outlined…

With the homosexuality cut out, Brick's dependence upon his friend is now explained by the failure of Big Daddy to provide strength and love, and this changed emphasis does make for exciting drama… The film's key scene—not in the play—is one in which Brick confronts his father with this painful truth… As they sit in a cellar disarranged with the old man's useless antiques, he tells Big Daddy that love cannot be bought… Newman moves powerfully from anguished looks to an eruption of emotion, smashing everything in sight, finally breaking down and crying: "All I wanted was a father, not a boss ... I wanted you to love me." Both are in pain—Big Daddy because of cancer, Brick because his crutch has (symbolically) been broken, and they need each other's he1p to get upstairs… Therefore the film ultimately becomes another statement of father-son alienation, and their coming to terms with it, as in "The Rack" and "Somebody Up There Likes Me," leads the characters to a new strength (and an upbeat ending not in the play).

Despite its compromises, the film was still daring by 1958 standards, and was an enormous commercial success… It received six Oscar nominations, including one for Newman as Best Actor—his first. Newman had developed, at last, a really impressive acting ability, and a distinctive screen image