Alternate Takes 07.04.09: Gangster Flicks
Posted by Shawn S. Lealos on 07.04.2009
With Michael Mann's Public Enemies showing the fall of John Dillinger, Alternate Takes looks back at the gangster genre from the silent classic Regeneration to the Scorsese masterpiece Goodfellas.
Welcome to Week 59 of Alternate Takes, I am Shawn S. Lealos and you have just entered my world.
For Independence Day weekend, there is a short supply of new releases. The era of giant blockbuster releases for the fourth may be a thing of the past as a typical Independence Day movie came out last week with Transformers. Instead, the first release we get this weekend is a kid's movie with the third Ice Age in glorious 3D. A limited release with the stars of My Big Fat Greek Wedding is also on tap with the wonderfully titled I Hate Valentine's Day, a movie that I will probably hate as well. My pick for the weekend is Public Enemies, a movie directed by Michael Mann. The fact that Mann helms this movie may make you believe it will be a slam dunk action fest, but that would be incorrect. There are a lot of gunfights but this movie is a bit long in the tooth and may not satisfy the film fan wanting action. But it is a movie that fits securely in the classical gangster genre, one of cinema's oldest, and that is the topic of this week's Alternate Takes.
PUBLIC ENEMIES DIRECTED BY MICHAEL MANN
Manhunter (1986)
The Last of the Mohicans (1992)
Heat (1995)
The Insider (1999)
Ali (2001)
Collateral (2004)
Miami Vice (2006)
Public Enemies (2009)
The gangster film is one of cinema's earliest genres. Along with the western, it was the earliest motion picture to glamorize what is almost a mythical time in our country's history. As early as 1915, the gangster film was one of the most popular genres for film fans worldwide. Regeneration told the story of a young boy who grows up in the streets and by the age of 25 leads his own gang. Directed by Raoul Walsh (The Big Trail, The Roaring Twenties), the film is one of the silent era's most revere and was added to the National Film Registry in 2000.
In 1930, the way in which gangster films were viewed changed forever with the release of Mervyn LeRoy's Little Caesar. In an era where the gangster still ruled the streets, Little Caesar was the first gangster film to deal with the Depression and the public's reaction to the fallen economy by presenting the myth of the self made man.
The film traces the rise to power of Caesar Enrico Bandello (Edward G. Robinson) as it parallels the rise of a historical figure such as Julius Caesar. Unlike the Shakespeare play, LeRoy chose to present a character aimed at the lower and middle class audiences as someone they might relate to. Rico is a man who has great aspirations but he is, at the end, a "little" figure who could only rise so far.
Just as with many gangster films, Little Caesar begins with a gas station robbery. It is at this point there is no turning back, the motif with all gangster films. Once we see the main character committing a major crime (which would be murder in many cases), his fate is sealed and there is no turning back. Even if the gangster attempts to rectify the situation and turn his life around, there is still the fact his crimes are predestined to return to haunt him.
Following in the footsteps of Little Caesar, the thirties presented us with a number of great gangster films. In 1931, James Cagney made a career defining choice when he portrayed Tom Powers in the fantastic film, The Public Enemy. This film will forever be linked to the Hays Office and the Motion Picture Production Code. The first principal of the code states "No picture shall be produced that will lower the moral standards of those who see it. Hence the sympathy of the audience should never be thrown to the side of crime, wrongdoing, evil or sin." It is common knowledge that if a person commits a crime in a movie, he must be punished for it by the end. In no case should a person ever "get away with it."
At the end of The Public Enemy, there is a hypocritical statement that the film is an attempt "to honestly depict an environment that exists today in a certain strata of American life, rather than to glorify the hoodlum or the criminal." While the lead character of Powers is killed at the end of the film, both the way he was portrayed by Cagney and the fantastic direction by William Wellman made the gangster archetype into the boisterous character we have all come to love.
The movie made Cagney a star and typecast him in the iconic tough guy role for the rest of his career. His only real successful reprieve was his Oscar winning performance in Yankee Doodle Dandy. While that was his crowning achievement, most people know him better for his roles in gangster films such as The Roaring Twenties and White Heat. Despite his personal appeal to moviegoers, the gangster archetype was developed and perfected in these early movies and would be the basis for its depiction over forty years later in movies such as The Godfather.
American author and critic Robert Warshow spent his life studying the western and gangster genres from a cultural standpoint. He pointed out the appeal of gangsters to popular culture in his book The Immediate Experience.
"The gangster is the man of the city, with the city's language and knowledge, with its queer and dishonest skills and its terrible daring, carrying his life in his hands like a placard, like a club... The real city, one might say, produces only criminals; the imaginary city produces the gangster: he is what we want to be and what we are afraid we may become."
In 1932, Howard Hawkes directed one of the most influential of all early gangster films - Scarface. Paul Muni starred as Antonio "Tony" Camonte, a character loosely based on Al Capone. This is interesting as Capone was starting his prison sentence when the film was released but because of the Hays Office, the censors forced Hawkes to shoot an end where Tony was found guilty and hung for his crimes. Hawkes finally grew tired of the censors' demands and released it with the original ending where Tony escaped the police and was gunned down, dying in the streets. Because he released it without the censor's approval, it could only be shown in the states where the censors had no say.
This film was remade in 1983 by Brian De Palma, the remake becoming a cult favorite starring Al Pacino. However, the original remains an important piece of cinema (and a great movie to boot) and was called the greatest American sound movie at one point by none other than Jean-Luc Godard.
When World War II began, the gangster films were replaced by the similar styled Film Noir with some great additions such as Rififi, The Killers and Brute Force.
However, the classical gangster film made a triumphant return in 1972 with Francis Ford Coppola's Godfather. The American public was in a different place in the seventies. While World War I and the depression made the gangster a hero to the poor and impoverished, the seventies came on the heels of the Vietnam War and the peace movement. People no longer saw the common criminal as a hero and routinely applauded when a hero like Clint Eastwood would gun them down with a quip and a smile.
Coppola made certain that his family of criminals were never lowered to the level of hurting the common people, stealing or killing from those of us who would view the movie. In fact, the common people - store clerks, restaurateurs, cab drivers - were the people protected by the Corleone family. When Don Vito Corleone walks the streets, he is treated as a hero to the poor. The only true enemy is the rival gangs who push the drugs and guns onto the streets.
While, over time, the crimes began to pile up against the family, we still felt saddened when the Don fell to his death. It was a different time, a simpler time it seemed. The violence was amped up to levels not seen in the earlier movies (Sonny's horrific death is an example) and, when the fall of the saintly Michael occurs, we get the familiar end as everyone must pay for their crimes. The trilogy ended up being the familiar story of the rise and fall of a man who is simply trying to survive.
The movies following became more violent, the Scarface remake a perfect example. However, a movie was released in 1990 that took everything before and wrapped it up in a perfect package. Goodfellas was not Martin Scorsese's first gangster film. The year after The Godfather premiered, Scorsese made a smaller film called Mean Streets owing more to the gangster films of the thirties than any other at that time.
With Goodfellas, Scorsese called on his long time partner Robert DeNiro to costar in a movie that turned the entire genre on its head. Ray Liotta stars as Henry Hill, a man accepted into the mob, working his way up through the hierarchy until he eventually turned on his own people for the FBI. It was a case where, despite all the bad things he was a part of, he was able to walk away unscathed simply by becoming a rat.
Much like The Godfather, Goodfellas' Mafia boss, Paulie Cicero, refuses to deal with drug dealing. He also brings the notion of family to the proceedings as he becomes more of a father to Henry then Henry's own father ever tried to be. The movie shows the downfall of the three main characters, Henry, Jimmy (DeNiro) and Tommy (Joe Pesci, in a career making performance). Jimmy's downfall comes in the form of his love of stealing, Tommy's in his sadistic personality and Henry falls into the poison that even Paulie refuses to deal with, drugs. The movie deals with the lifestyles of the gangsters and the strange situation in which it all seems to be natural everyday lifestyles.
When it came time to either stand up for the only family that ever cared for him or turn them all over for his own survival, he chose self preservation. However, don't think this is any different then the stories from the thirties. When a gangster starts out in the movie, he makes a decision that sets his fate into motion. There is no turning back and the man we are asked to follow will fall by the end of the movie. Henry Hill does not die and served no jail time. However, Henry Hill was placed in witness protection and found himself in an ordinary life as an ordinary man. He could, at one point, walk into the best restaurant in town, be taken in ahead of everyone waiting in line and seated at the best table in the house. By the end, he is just like you and I. He rose as high as he was allowed and then came crashing back down to Earth.
The story of the gangster is long and storied. It is about the rise and fall of man. Whether the fall is a death, a prison sentence or in the case of Henry Hill, a life less ordinary, the gangster always falls. The gangsters light will shine brightly but just as quickly the man will crash and burn. It's the way it was meant to be and we wouldn't want it any other way.
In 1930, the way in which gangster films were viewed changed forever with the release of Mervyn LeRoy's Little Caesar. In an era where the gangster still ruled the streets, Little Caesar was the first gangster film to deal with the Depression and the public's reaction to the fallen economy by presenting the myth of the self made man. 
At the end of The Public Enemy, there is a hypocritical statement that the film is an attempt "to honestly depict an environment that exists today in a certain strata of American life, rather than to glorify the hoodlum or the criminal." While the lead character of Powers is killed at the end of the film, both the way he was portrayed by Cagney and the fantastic direction by William Wellman made the gangster archetype into the boisterous character we have all come to love.
In 1932, Howard Hawkes directed one of the most influential of all early gangster films - Scarface. Paul Muni starred as Antonio "Tony" Camonte, a character loosely based on Al Capone. This is interesting as Capone was starting his prison sentence when the film was released but because of the Hays Office, the censors forced Hawkes to shoot an end where Tony was found guilty and hung for his crimes. Hawkes finally grew tired of the censors' demands and released it with the original ending where Tony escaped the police and was gunned down, dying in the streets. Because he released it without the censor's approval, it could only be shown in the states where the censors had no say.
Coppola made certain that his family of criminals were never lowered to the level of hurting the common people, stealing or killing from those of us who would view the movie. In fact, the common people - store clerks, restaurateurs, cab drivers - were the people protected by the Corleone family. When Don Vito Corleone walks the streets, he is treated as a hero to the poor. The only true enemy is the rival gangs who push the drugs and guns onto the streets.
Much like The Godfather, Goodfellas' Mafia boss, Paulie Cicero, refuses to deal with drug dealing. He also brings the notion of family to the proceedings as he becomes more of a father to Henry then Henry's own father ever tried to be. The movie shows the downfall of the three main characters, Henry, Jimmy (DeNiro) and Tommy (Joe Pesci, in a career making performance). Jimmy's downfall comes in the form of his love of stealing, Tommy's in his sadistic personality and Henry falls into the poison that even Paulie refuses to deal with, drugs. The movie deals with the lifestyles of the gangsters and the strange situation in which it all seems to be natural everyday lifestyles. 
