Is my dog hunting my cat, or just interested?

So I have 3 dogs, 2 of them are completely fine around cats and have lived with cats before, but my one dog, a large male standard poodle, has never been around cats and is relatively young (2-3 yrs old). He gets excited at a lot of things, and when I brought my new cat home I slowly tried to introduce them to each other. So far, my poodle likes to intensely stare at the cat with his ears to attention, very still with his tail wagging sometimes. Whenever the cat makes any fast movements, he flinches and tenses up like he’s gonna chase, but his recall is very good, so if I say his name he’ll stay still. In my opinion, which means very little because I’m no professional, it looks like he’s hunting the cat. I just want to know if anyone who has experience with poodles or just dogs and cats in general knows if it really is hunting, or just very excited intense interest or something. If it is hunting, I’d also like to learn how to resolve it if possible. I don’t want to have to give up the cat, but I will for its own safety as a last resort.