Posted 9:01 am Wednesday, December 05, 2012
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Best picture Oscar winner still packs devastating punch
The mark of a truly great film is its ability to remain relevant and emotionally resonant decades beyond its time and especially in the face of being parodied or otherwise copied.
Elia Kazan's “On the Waterfront” is one such movie.
This is, of course, an observation made by countless others but it's one that bears repeating, although I suppose I'm mostly making it to myself. My point is that this is one of those classic movies that I'm both embarrassed to have taken so long to get around to watching and impressed by how well it holds up in the face of such universal praise.
The film follows Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando), a kid with a once-promising boxing career cut short due to a fixed fight. Now he's in the pocket of Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb), a corrupt union boss who controls the workers at the local shipyard. He's assured Johnny that he's “D and D” (deaf and dumb) when it comes to the death of Joey Doyle, a fellow worker who was about to testify about the corruption running rampant in the union.
However, with the spurring of a Catholic priest (Karl Malden) and Joey's sister, Edie (Eva Marie Saint), whom he falls in love with, Terry begins to suffer a crisis of conscience about his loyalty to his benefactor and doing the right thing.
Elia Kazan's “On the Waterfront” is one such movie.
This is, of course, an observation made by countless others but it's one that bears repeating, although I suppose I'm mostly making it to myself. My point is that this is one of those classic movies that I'm both embarrassed to have taken so long to get around to watching and impressed by how well it holds up in the face of such universal praise.
The film follows Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando), a kid with a once-promising boxing career cut short due to a fixed fight. Now he's in the pocket of Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb), a corrupt union boss who controls the workers at the local shipyard. He's assured Johnny that he's “D and D” (deaf and dumb) when it comes to the death of Joey Doyle, a fellow worker who was about to testify about the corruption running rampant in the union.
However, with the spurring of a Catholic priest (Karl Malden) and Joey's sister, Edie (Eva Marie Saint), whom he falls in love with, Terry begins to suffer a crisis of conscience about his loyalty to his benefactor and doing the right thing.
“On the Waterfront” is an interesting contrast to Kazan's and Brando's first film collaboration “A Streetcar Named Desire.” It often feels far more cinematic than “Streetcar.” This is of course in large part due to it not being adapted from a stage play, but Kazan also employs a more stylish approach to his camera angles and editing than was seen in “Streetcar.” One segment in particular, where Terry finally confesses his unwitting role in Edie's brother's murder, features some of the most brilliant editing I've ever seen. Not just for the technical skill, but for the way it manages to heighten the emotion of the scene while actually obscuring most of the dialogue.
Brando gets the most attention from the film, and for good reason. His work with Kazan was a huge factor in helping to change the way actors performed in film and his work as Terry feels even more involved and complete than in “Streetcar.” It's a bravado bit of acting and is rightly praised. It's really that good.
That said, while it's Brando's bits that get quoted most often, it's the speeches from Malden's Father Berry that I loved most. He's the unsung backbone of this group of stevedores (and by extension, the film), the only one who thinks it possible to stand up to the greed that keeps them in their place. Father Berry defies the typical passive portrayal of priests (or really any religiously-inclined character) in movies and frames him as a man of action, willing to stand with anyone brave enough to defy their master. It's not often you find a movie with a priest you want to stand up and fight with, but Malden's performance provides just that and in turn delivers the soul of the film.
Brando gets the most attention from the film, and for good reason. His work with Kazan was a huge factor in helping to change the way actors performed in film and his work as Terry feels even more involved and complete than in “Streetcar.” It's a bravado bit of acting and is rightly praised. It's really that good.
That said, while it's Brando's bits that get quoted most often, it's the speeches from Malden's Father Berry that I loved most. He's the unsung backbone of this group of stevedores (and by extension, the film), the only one who thinks it possible to stand up to the greed that keeps them in their place. Father Berry defies the typical passive portrayal of priests (or really any religiously-inclined character) in movies and frames him as a man of action, willing to stand with anyone brave enough to defy their master. It's not often you find a movie with a priest you want to stand up and fight with, but Malden's performance provides just that and in turn delivers the soul of the film.
This was also a quite personal film for Kazan, essentially serving as his justification for testifying to Congress about Communist infiltration into Hollywood (Kazan himself was a former member of the Communist Party). Kazan may have stated that the film is “ambivalent about the act of informing,” but a single viewing of the film proves that to be an utterly false statement. Brando's speech at the end to Johnny Friendly might as well be delivered by Kazan himself.
Next week I'll take a look at the film that introduced one of cinema's immortal icons to the silver screen, “East of Eden.”
Next week I'll take a look at the film that introduced one of cinema's immortal icons to the silver screen, “East of Eden.”
