Crime films , in the broadest sense, is a film genre inspired by and analogous to the crime fiction literary genre. Films of this genre generally involve various aspects of crime and its detection. Stylistically, the genre may overlap and combine with many other genres, such as drama or gangster film , but also include comedy , and, in turn, is divided into many sub-genres, such as mystery , suspense or noir .
156-453: Drugstore Cowboy is a 1989 American crime drama film directed by the American filmmaker Gus Van Sant . Written by Van Sant and Daniel Yost and based on an autobiographical novel by James Fogle , the film stars Matt Dillon , Kelly Lynch , Heather Graham and William S. Burroughs . It was Van Sant's second film as director. At the time the film was made, the source novel by Fogle
312-524: A "very middle-class" upbringing and "a pretty normal childhood". He attended Jordan Elementary School, where he was bullied. There, he learned to play the bugle and guitar . His father taught him to play the ukulele . During the summers, he visited maternal relatives in Gridley and Marysville . He later recalled that it was an uncle's raspy, gravelly timbre that inspired his own singing voice. In 1959, his parents separated and his father moved away from
468-470: A 97% approval rating based on 29 reviews, with an average score of 8/10 and a consensus: " Drugstore Cowboy takes us into a violent, transient world with cool, contemplative style". Review aggregator Metacritic assigned the film a weighted average score of 82 based on 15 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim". In his print review for the Chicago Sun-Times , Ebert gave the film 4 stars out of
624-614: A European tour, there making television appearances and press interviews; in Austria he was the subject of a short documentary. From there, he flew to Australia for his first tour of that country before returning to Los Angeles in May. Waits was dissatisfied with Elektra-Asylum, who he felt had lost interest in him as an artist in favor of their more commercially successful acts like the Eagles , Linda Ronstadt , Carly Simon and Queen . After
780-528: A G-String", a female stripper joined him onstage. He began 1977 by touring Japan for the first time. Back in Los Angeles, he encountered various problems. One female fan, recently escaped from a mental health institution in Illinois , began stalking him and lurking outside his Tropicana apartment. In May 1977, Waits and close friend Chuck E. Weiss were arrested for fighting with police officers in
936-416: A Hollywood feature went from $ 20,000 in 1914 to $ 300,000 in 1924. Silver and Ursini stated that the earliest crime features were by Austrian émigré director Josef von Sternberg whose films like Underworld (1927) eliminated most of the causes for criminal behavior and focused on the criminal perpetrators themselves which would anticipate the popular gangster films of the 1930s. The groundwork for
1092-561: A Hooker in Minneapolis’ and ‘Red Shoes by the Drugstore,’ his writing became ever more vivid, compact, and complex." From the album, Waits's first single, a cover of "Somewhere" from West Side Story , was released, but it failed to chart. For his Blue Valentine tour, Waits assembled a new band; he also had a gas station built as a set for his performances. His support act on the tour was Leon Redbone . In April, he embarked on
1248-559: A benefit performance to raise funds for the legal defense of his friend Don Hyde, who had been charged with distributing LSD . He wrote "Walk Away" and "The Fall of Troy" for the soundtrack of Dead Man Walking (1995) and "Little Drop of Poison" for The End of Violence (1997). In 1998, Island released Beautiful Maladies , a compilation of 23 Waits tracks from his albums with the company, selected by Waits himself. After his contract with Island expired, Waits decided not to try to renew it, particularly as Blackwell had resigned from
1404-597: A boy's sense of wonder with the world. A legend in Rainville since he burned his house down and took off for the Big Time. Reviews were generally positive. He had initially considered a run in New York City but decided against it. The songs from the show were recorded for his ninth studio album, Franks Wild Years , and released by Island in 1987. NME ranked Franks Wild Years fifth on its list of albums of
1560-1050: A brief appearance as a plainclothes cop in The Two Jakes (1990) and played a disabled war veteran in Terry Gilliam 's The Fisher King (1991). He had a cameo in Steve Rash 's Queens Logic (1991) and played a pilot-for-hire in Héctor Babenco 's At Play in the Fields of the Lord (1991). He appeared as himself fishing with John Lurie on Fishing with John . He was Renfield in Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992). Waits starred as Earl Piggot, an alcoholic limousine driver, in Robert Altman 's Short Cuts (1993). Hoskyns said that this "may be
1716-478: A broader category called "film type", mystery and suspense as "macro-genres", and film noir as a "screenwriter's pathway" explaining that these categories are additive rather than exclusionary. Chinatown would be an example of a film that is a drama (film type) crime film (super-genre) that is also a noir (pathway) mystery (macro-genre). The definition of what constitutes a crime film is not straightforward. Criminologist Nicole Hahn Rafter in her book Shots in
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#17327910319441872-505: A change signaled by films like Chinatown (1974) and The Wild Bunch (1969) noting that older genres were being transformed through cultivation of nostalgia and a critique of the myths cultivated by their respective genres. Todd found that this found its way into crime films of the 1980s with films that could be labeled as post-modern , in which he felt that "genres blur, pastiche prevails, and once-fixed ideals, such as time and meaning, are subverted and destabilized". This would apply to
2028-478: A circus strongman, and Angelo Rossitto , a dwarf. Jon Parles of GQ wrote that "On Swordfishtrombones , Waits has made a breakthrough – he’s found music as evocative as his words. Waits’s grumble of a voice now bounces off a peculiar assortment of horns and percussion and organ and keyboards, as if he’d led a Salvation Army band into a broken-down Hong Kong disco. It’s as if he’s shifted from monologues to screenplays.” According to David Smay, Swordfishtrombones
2184-575: A coffee shop. They were charged with two counts of disturbing the peace but were acquitted after the defense produced eight witnesses who refuted the police officers' account of the incident. In response, Waits sued the Los Angeles Police Department and five years later was awarded $ 7,500 in damages. In July and August 1977, he recorded his fourth studio album, Foreign Affairs ; Bob Alcivar had been employed as its arranger . The album included "I Never Talk to Strangers",
2340-401: A composer who created his own instruments out of everyday materials. Waits began to use images rather than moods or characters as the basis for his songs. I like to imagine how it feels for the object to become music. Imagine you're the lid to a fifty-gallon drum. That's your job. You work at that. That's your whole life. Then one day I find you and I say, "We're gonna drill a hole in you, run
2496-575: A conservative era. For crime films, this led to various reactions, including political films that critiqued official policies and citizen's political apathy. These included films like Missing (1982), Silkwood (1983), and No Way Out (1987). Prison films and courtroom dramas would also be politically charged with films like Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985) and Cry Freedom (1987). While films about serial killers existed in earlier films such as M (1931) and Peeping Tom (1960),
2652-454: A crooked shell" and portrayed gangsters who showcased the "romantic mystique of the doomed criminal." The 1940s formed an ambivalence toward the criminal heroes. Leitch suggested that this shift was from the decline in high-profile organized crime, partly because of the repeal of Prohibition in 1933 and partly because of the well-publicized success of the FBI. Unlike the crime films of the 1930s,
2808-513: A door, and slammed the door behind him, and on the door it said, I swear to God, 'KEEP OUT. This room is for entertainers ONLY.' And I knew, at that moment, that I had to get into show business as soon as possible." He recalls: "I first saw James Brown in 1962 at an outdoor theatre in San Diego and it was indescribable ... it was like putting a finger in a light socket ... It was really like seeing mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral on Christmas." By
2964-471: A drunken piano player in Stallone's Paradise Alley (1978). With Paul Hampton , Waits also began writing a movie musical, although this project never came to fruition. Another project he began at this time was a book about entertainers of the past whom he admired. In July 1978, Waits began the recording sessions for Blue Valentine . Part way through the sessions, he replaced his musicians to create
3120-619: A duet with Midler, with whom he was still in an intermittent relationship. She appeared with him at the Troubadour to sing the song; the next day he repaid the favor by performing at a gay rights benefit at the Hollywood Bowl that Midler was involved with. Foreign Affairs was not as well received by critics as its predecessor, and unlike Small Change failed to make the Billboard Top 100 album chart. That year, he began
3276-484: A film described as "crime/ action " or an "action/crime" or other hybrids was "only a semantic exercise" as both genres are important in the construction phase of the narrative. Mark Bould in A Companion to Film Noir stated that categorization of multiple generic genre labels was common in film reviews and rarely concerned with succinct descriptions that evoke elements of the film's form, content and make no claims beyond on how these elements combine. Leitch, stated that
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#17327910319443432-557: A friendship; Waits called Jarmusch "Dr. Sullen", while Jarmusch called Waits "The Prince of Melancholy". Waits had devised a musical, Franks Wild Years , loosely based on "Frank's Wild Years" from Swordfishtrombones . In late 1985, he reached an agreement that the play would be performed by the Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago 's Briar Street Theatre Waits starred as Frank, who he described as Quite
3588-469: A furious Gentry assaults Bob. Believing a hex has been brought upon them, the group goes "crossroading" and robs a drugstore via an open transom . They find their haul includes vials of pure powdered Dilaudid worth thousands of dollars each. Declaring that, "when you're hot, you're hot," Bob convinces Dianne that he should rob a hospital. During the robbery, Bob is almost captured, and the group returns to their motel to find Nadine has fatally overdosed on
3744-405: A guy. Grew up in a bird's eye frozen, oven-ready, rural American town where Bing , Bob , Dean , Wayne & Jerry are considered major constellations. Frank, mistakenly, thinks he can stuff himself into their shorts and present himself to an adoring world. He is a combination of Will Rogers and Mark Twain , playing accordion -- but without the wisdom they possessed. He has a poet's heart and
3900-482: A lawsuit against Frito-Lay for using an impersonator performing "Step Right Up" in an advertisement for Doritos ; it came to court in April 1990, and Waits won the case in 1992. He received a $ 2.6 million settlement, a sum larger than his earnings from all of his previous albums combined. This earned him and Brennan reputations as tireless adversaries. In 1989, Waits began planning a collaboration with Robert Wilson ,
4056-403: A less jazz-oriented sound; for the album, he switched from a piano to an electric guitar as his main instrument. For the album's back cover, Waits used a picture of himself and Jones leaning against his car, a 1964 Ford Thunderbird , taken by Elliot Gilbert. Per Bowman, "Waits gradually began writing about junkies and prostitutes instead of skid-row drunks. In songs such as 'Christmas Card From
4212-491: A locker of the Hollywood Athletic Club. The Asphalt Jungle (1950) consolidated a tendency to define criminal subculture as a mirror of American culture. The cycle of caper films were foreshadowed by films like The Killers (1946) and Criss Cross (1949) to later examples like The Killing (1956) and Odds Against Tomorrow (1959). Leitch wrote that these films used the planning and action of
4368-538: A loft apartment near Union Square . Waits found New York City life frustrating, although it allowed him to meet many new musicians and artists. He befriended John Lurie of The Lounge Lizards , and the duo began sharing a music studio in the Westbeth artist-community building in Greenwich Village . He began networking in the city's arts scene, and, at a party Jean-Michel Basquiat held for Lurie, he met
4524-435: A love of R&B and soul singers like Ray Charles and Wilson Pickett , as well as country music and Roy Orbison . Bob Dylan later became an inspiration; Waits placed transcriptions of Dylan's lyrics on his bedroom walls. Waits recalls: "I was fifteen and I snuck into see Lightnin' Hopkins . Amazing show. Every time he opened his mouth he had that orchestra of gold teeth, and I was devastated ... He walked through
4680-684: A mobster known as The Snapper Kid. Regeneration (1915) was an early feature-length film about a gangster who saved from a life of crime by a social worker. These two early films and films like Tod Browning 's Outside the Law (1920) that deal with the world of criminal activity were described by Silver and Ursini as being gangsters "constrained by a strong moral code". Stuart Kaminsky in American Film Genres (1974) stated that prior to Little Caesar (1931), gangster characters were in films were essentially romances . European films of
4836-537: A morbid, sinister nightmare, one that applied the quirks of his experimental '80s classics to stunningly evocative—and often harrowing—effect ... Waits's most affecting and powerful recording, even if it isn't his most accessible." The album's closing track, "That Feel", was co-written with Keith Richards . Bone Machine won the Grammy for Best Alternative Music Album ; in response, Waits asked Jarmusch: "alternative to what ?!" Waits decided to record an album of
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4992-663: A more eclectic and experimental sound influenced by Harry Partch and Captain Beefheart , as heard on the loose trilogy Swordfishtrombones (1983), Rain Dogs (1985) and Franks Wild Years (1987). Waits starred in Jim Jarmusch 's Down by Law (1986), lent his voice to his Mystery Train (1989), composed the soundtrack for his Night on Earth (1991) and appeared in his Coffee and Cigarettes (2003). He collaborated with Robert Wilson and William S. Burroughs on
5148-414: A package of drugs before leaving. Bob gives the drugs to Tom (who rejects all of them except for a bottle of Dilaudid). Returning to his room, Bob is attacked by two masked figures, one of whom is David, who thinks he has drugs. Bob tells them that he is clean, but David does not believe this and shoots him. A neighbor phones for help, and Bob is loaded onto a stretcher. Asked who shot him, Bob tells Gentry it
5304-488: A phone call with their mutual friend Chuck E. Weiss, Waits told Jones, "Chuck E.'s in love". This was the inspiration for her song " Chuck E.'s in Love ". Jones's musical career was taking off; after an appearance on Saturday Night Live , "Chuck E.'s In Love" reached number 4 in the singles chart, straining her relationship with Waits. Their relationship was further damaged by Jones's heroin addiction. Waits joined Jones for
5460-636: A poor neighborhood known for its Hispanic and bohemian communities. He continued performing at the Troubadour and there met David Geffen , who gave Waits a recording contract with his Asylum Records . Jerry Yester was chosen to produce his first album, with the recording sessions taking place in Hollywood's Sunset Sound studios. The resulting album, Closing Time , was released in March 1973, although it attracted little attention and did not sell well. Biographer Barney Hoskyns noted that Closing Time
5616-824: A possible 4. He described Dillon as offering "one of the great recent American movie performances" and highlighted how the film was successful by portraying the characters not as "bad people [but] sick people" who formed an unorthodox family to cope with "the desperation in their lives". Ebert also singled out Burroughs's cameo as "a guest appearance by Death." Drugstore Cowboy won the following awards: Crime film Screenwriter and scholar Eric R. Williams identified crime film as one of eleven super-genres in his Screenwriters Taxonomy , claiming that all feature-length narrative films can be classified by these super-genres. The other ten super-genres are action, fantasy, horror, romance, science fiction, slice of life, sports, thriller, war and western. Williams identifies drama in
5772-535: A psychopathic personality." Drew Todd in Shots in the Mirror: Crime Films and Society described the character as different than films featuring rebellious characters from the 1940s and 1950s, with a character whose anger is directed against the state, mixed with fantasies of vigilante justice. Films like Dirty Harry , The French Connection and Straw Dogs (1971) that presented a violent vigilante as
5928-585: A relationship with the singer-songwriter Rickie Lee Jones ; their work and styles influenced each other. In October 1977, he returned to touring with the Nocturnal Emissions; it was on this tour that he first began using props onstage, in this case a street lamp. Again, he found the tour exhausting. In March 1978, he embarked on his second tour of Japan. During these years, Waits sought to broaden his career beyond music. He befriended actor and director Sylvester Stallone and made his film debut as
6084-470: A remake of The Defiant Ones (1958). The cycle generally slowed down by the mid 1970s. Prison films closely followed the formulas of films of the past while having an increased level of profanity, violence and sex. Cool Hand Luke (1967) inaugurated the revival and was followed into the 1970s with films like Papillon (1973), Midnight Express (1978) and Escape from Alcatraz (1979). When Ronald Reagan became president in 1980, he ushered in
6240-443: A reporter that he "just needed a new urban landscape. I've always wanted to live here. It's a good working atmosphere for me". He considered writing a Broadway musical based on Thornton Wilder 's Our Town . A rotoscoped Waits performed "The One That Got Away" in the music video Tom Waits For No One (1979). Francis Ford Coppola asked Waits to return to Los Angeles to write a soundtrack for his forthcoming film, One from
6396-589: A reputation for signing more experimental acts, such as King Crimson , Roxy Music and Sparks . Waits did not tour to promote the album, partly because Brennan was pregnant. Although unenthusiastic about the new trend for music videos , he appeared in one for the song " In the Neighborhood ", co-directed by Haskell Wexler and Michael A. Russ . Russ also designed the Swordfishtrombones album cover, featuring an image of Waits with Lee Kolima ,
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6552-413: A robbery todramatize the "irreducible unreasonableness of life." The themes of existential despair made the these film popular with European filmmakers, who would make their own heist films like Rififi (1955) and Il bidone (1955). Filmmakers of the coming French New Wave movement would expand on these crime films into complex mixtures of nostalgia and critique with later pictures like Elevator to
6708-420: A savior. By the mid-1970s, a traditional lead with good looks, brawn and bravery was replaced with characters who Todd described as a "pathological outcast, embittered and impulsively violent." Hollywood productions began courting films produced and marketed by white Americans for the purpose of trying to attract a new audience with blaxploitation film. These films were almost exclusively crime films following
6864-409: A stolen bottle of Dilaudid. According to Bob, she has also put "the worst of all hexes" on them by leaving a hat on her bed. After temporarily storing Nadine's body in the motel's attic, they are alerted by the motel manager that their room was previously booked for a sheriffs' convention, and they must check out. Bob, suffering tremendous anxiety and stress-induced visions of handcuffs and prison, sneaks
7020-536: A synthesizer. The score and soundtrack were also the first that Goldenthal worked on with Richard Martinez, a music producer whose "computer expertise and sound production assistance" became the basis for frequent subsequent collaborations. AllMusic rated this soundtrack three stars out of five. The film was very well received critically and is listed on the Top Ten lists of both Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert , for films released in 1989. On Rotten Tomatoes , it has
7176-536: A theater director he had known throughout the 1980s. Their project was the "cowboy opera" The Black Rider . It was based on a German folk tale, the Freischütz , which had inspired Carl Maria von Weber 's opera Der Freischütz (1821). In 2004, Waits related that "Wilson is my teacher. There's nobody that's affected me that much as an artist". Waits wrote the music and, at the suggestion of Allen Ginsberg , Waits and Wilson approached William S. Burroughs to pen
7332-776: A three-piece band embarked on a U.S. tour, where he was the supporting act for more established artists. He supported Tom Rush at Washington D.C. 's The Cellar Door , Danny O'Keefe in Cambridge, Massachusetts 's Club Passim , Charlie Rich at New York City 's Max's Kansas City , Martha Reeves and the Vandellas in East Lansing, Michigan , and John P. Hammond in San Francisco . Waits returned to Los Angeles in June, feeling demoralized about his career. That month, he
7488-422: A visit to the motel and says that Trousinski has been making threats against Bob, whom Gentry encourages staying sober. Bob later witnesses David bullying a young man who supposedly owes him money. Bob intervenes and lets the man escape, much to David's frustration. One night, Dianne arrives at the motel and reveals that she is now in a relationship with Rick, the group's new leader. Dianne asks Bob what happened on
7644-564: A week. In August 1980, they married at a 24-hour wedding chapel on Manchester Boulevard in Watts before honeymooning in Tralee , a town in County Kerry , Ireland, where Brennan had family. A whip and a chair. The Bible. The Book of Revelations. She grew up Catholic, you know, blood and liquor and guilt. She pulverizes me so that I don't just write the same song over and over again. Which
7800-415: A wire through you, hang you from the ceiling of the studio, bang on you with a mallet, and now you're in show business, baby!" — Waits on his unique use of instruments Waits wrote the songs for Swordfishtrombones during a two-week trip to Ireland. He recorded it at Sunset Sound studios and produced it himself; Brennan often attended the sessions and gave him advice. Swordfishtrombones abandoned
7956-416: Is Cheap . Rain Dogs also marked Marc Ribot 's debut as a session guitarist; he would play on many subsequent Waits albums. Jean-Baptiste Mondino directed a music video of " Downtown Train " featuring boxer Jake LaMotta . The song was subsequently covered by Patty Smyth in 1987, and later by Rod Stewart , where it reached the top five in 1990. In 1985, Rolling Stone named Waits its "Songwriter of
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#17327910319448112-402: Is a style of crime film that originated from two cinematic precursors: the gangster film and the gentleman thief film. The essential element in these films is the plot concentration on the commission of a single crime of great monetary significance, at least on the surface level. The narratives in these films focus on the heist being wrapped up in the execution of the crime more or at as much as
8268-474: Is actually the only film director in Hollywood that has a conscience ... most of them are egomaniacs and money-grabbing bastards". In September, Brennan gave birth to their daughter, Kellesimone. Waits was determined to keep his family life separate from his public image and to spend as much time as possible with his daughter. With Brennan and their child, Waits moved to New York City to be closer to Brennan's parents and Island's U.S. office. They settled into
8424-423: Is different just as crime are different than horror, science fiction and period drama films. Rafter also suggested that Westerns could be considered crime films, but that this perception would only be "muddying conceptual waters." The history of the crime film before 1940 follows reflected the changing social attitudes toward crime and criminals. In the first twenty years of the 20th Century, American society
8580-589: Is that we both got into the same leaky boat. Maybe the weight drags it down, because now you've two people sitting in it. Sorry, baby! But on the other hand you've also got two peoples' imagination to patch it up again. Everybody knows she's the brains behind Pa, as Dylan might have said. I'm just the figurehead. She's the one who's steering the ship." Recording of Waits's One from the Heart soundtrack began in October 1980 and continued until September 1981. A number of
8736-561: Is what a lot of people do, including myself. — Waits on what his wife brought to his creative process Returning to Los Angeles, Waits and Brennan moved into a Union Avenue apartment. Hoskyns noted that with Brennan, "Waits had found the stabilizing, nurturing companion he'd always wanted", and that she brought him "a sense of emotional security he had never known" before. At the same time, many of his old friends felt cut off after his marriage. Waits said of Brennan: "She rescued me. Maybe I rescued her too; that's often how it works. Upshot
8892-640: The British Board of Film Censors or conveyed mostly through narration. Box-office receipts began to grow stronger towards the late 1960s. Hollywood's demise of the Hays Code standards would allow for further violent, risqué and gory films. As college students at the University of Berkeley and University of Columbia demonstrated against racial injustice and the Vietnam, Hollywood generally ignored
9048-578: The Coast Guard . He enrolled at Chula Vista's Southwestern Community College to study photography, for a time considering a career in the field. He continued pursuing his musical interests, taking piano lessons. He began frequenting venues around San Diego, being drawn into the city's folk scene. In 1969 he was hired as an occasional doorman for the Heritage coffeehouse, which held regular performances from folk musicians. He also began to sing at
9204-503: The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in 1935), promoted bigger budgets and wider press for his organization and himself through a well-publicized crusade against such real world gangsters as Machine Gun Kelly , Pretty Boy Floyd and John Dillinger . Hoover's fictionalized exploits were glorified in future films such as G Men (1935). Through the 1930s, American films view of criminals were predominantly glamorized, but as
9360-515: The Pacific Northwest robbing pharmacies and hospitals to support their habits. After stealing from a Portland, Oregon , pharmacy, they drive home to get high , and are visited by David, a local low-life seeking hard-to-find Dilaudid . Bob claims they have none, but offers to trade him morphine for speed . Initially reluctant, David is persuaded to trade and leaves. Later, police officers led by Detective Gentry, who correctly assumes
9516-779: The San Diego folk circuit. He relocated to Los Angeles in 1972, where he worked as a songwriter before signing a recording contract with Asylum Records . His first albums were the jazzy Closing Time (1973), The Heart of Saturday Night (1974) and Nighthawks at the Diner (1975), which reflected his lyrical interest in poverty, criminality and nightlife. He repeatedly toured the United States, Europe and Japan, and found greater critical and commercial success with Small Change (1976), Blue Valentine (1978) and Heartattack and Vine (1980). During this period, Waits entered
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#17327910319449672-675: The Troubadour in West Hollywood. It was there, in the autumn of 1971, that Waits came to the attention of Herb Cohen , who signed him to publishing and recording contracts. The recordings that were produced under that recording agreement were eventually released in the early 1990s as The Early Years and The Early Years, Volume Two . Quitting his job at Napoleone's to concentrate on his songwriting career, in early 1972 Waits moved to an apartment in Silver Lake , Los Angeles,
9828-1045: The Western film as they lack both the instantly recognizable or the unique intent of other genres such as parody films. Leitch and Rafter both write that it would be impractical to call every film in which a crime produces the central dramatic situation a crime film. Leitch gave an example that most Westerns from The Great Train Robbery (1903) to Unforgiven (1992) often have narratives about crime and punishment, but are not generally described as crime films. Films with crime-and-punishment themes like Winchester 73 (1950) and Rancho Notorious (1952) are classified as Westerns rather than crime films because their setting takes precedence over their story. Alain Silver and James Ursini argued in A Companion to Crime Fiction (2020) that "unquestionably most Western films are crime films" but that that their overriding generic identification
9984-430: The folk scene during the 1970s, but his music since the 1980s has reflected the influence of such diverse genres as rock , Delta blues , opera , vaudeville , cabaret , funk , hip hop and experimental techniques verging on industrial music . Per The Wall Street Journal , Waits “has composed a body of work that’s at least comparable to any songwriter’s in pop today. A keen, sensitive and sympathetic chronicler of
10140-438: The gangster film as both a genre on its own terms and a subgenre of the crime film. In these films, the gangster and their values have been imbedded through decades of reiteration and revision, generally with a masculine style where an elaboration on a codes of behavior by acts of decisive violence are central concerns. The archetypal gangster film was the Hollywood production Little Caesar (1931). A moral panic followed
10296-422: The "cowboy opera" The Black Rider (1990), the songs for which were released on the album The Black Rider . Waits and Wilson collaborated again on Alice (2002) and Woyzeck (2000). Bone Machine (1992) and Mule Variations (1999) won Grammys for Best Alternative Music Album and Best Contemporary Folk Album , respectively. In 2002, the songs from Alice and Wozzeck were recorded and released on
10452-612: The 1940s films were based more on fictional tales with gangsters played by Paul Muni in Angel on My Shoulder (1946) and Cagney in White Heat (1949) were self-consciously anachronistic. Filmmakers from this period were fleeing Europe due to the rise of Nazism. These directors such as Fritz Lang , Robert Siodmak , and Billy Wilder would make crime films in the late 1930s and 1940s that were later described as film noir by French critics. Several films from 1944 like The Woman in
10608-689: The 1980s had an emphasis on the serial nature of their crimes with a larger number of films focusing on the repetitive nature of some murders. While many of these films were teen-oriented pictures, they also included films like Dressed to Kill (1980) and Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986) and continued into the 2000s with films like Seven (1995), Kiss the Girls (1997), and American Psycho (2000). In an article by John G. Cawelti titled " Chinatown and Generic Transformations in Recent American Films" (1979), Cawleti noticed
10764-652: The 1990s with films like Wild at Heart (1990). Quentin Tarantino would continue this trend in the 1990s with films where violence and crime is treated lightly such as Reservoir Dogs (1992), Pulp Fiction (1994) and Natural Born Killers (1994) while Lynch and the Coens would continue with Fargo (1996) and Lost Highway (1997). Other directors such as Martin Scorsese and Sidney Lumet would continue to more traditional crime films Goodfellas , Prince of
10920-498: The American crime film which began rejecting linear storytelling and distinctions between right and wrong with works from directors like Brian de Palma with Dressed to Kill and Scarface and works from The Coen Brothers and David Lynch whose had Todd described as having "stylized yet gritty and dryly humorous pictures evoking dream states" with films like Blood Simple (1984) and Blue Velvet (1986) and would continue into
11076-522: The City (1980), Q & A (1990), and Casino (1995). Other trends of the 1990s extended boundaries of crime films, ranging from main characters who were female or minorities with films like Thelma and Louise (1991), Swoon (1991), Devil in a Blue Dress (1995), Bound (1996) and Dolores Claiborne (1996). Every genre is a subgenre of a wider genre from whose contexts its own conventions take their meaning, it makes sense to think of
11232-794: The Gallows (1958), Breathless (1960) and Shoot the Piano Player (1960). Following the classical noir period of 1940 to 1958, a return to the violence of the two previous decades. By 1960, film was losing popularity to television as the mass form of media entertainment. Despite To The crime film countered this by providing material no acceptable for television, first with a higher level of onscreen violence. Films like Psycho (1960) and Black Sunday (1960) marked an increase in onscreen violence in film. Prior to these films, violence and gorier scenes were cut in Hammer film productions by
11388-441: The Heart . Waits was excited, but conflicted, by the prospect; Coppola wanted him to create music akin to his early work, a genre that he was trying to leave behind, and thus he characterized the project as an artistic "step backwards". He nevertheless returned to Los Angeles to work on the soundtrack in a room set aside for the purpose in Coppola's Hollywood studios. This style of working was new to Waits; he later recalled that he
11544-675: The Heritage; his set initially consisted largely of covers of Dylan and Red Sovine 's " Phantom 309 ". In time, he performed his own material as well, often parodies of country songs or bittersweet ballads influenced by his relationships; these included early songs " Ol' 55 " and "I Hope That I Don't Fall in Love With You". As his reputation grew, he played at other San Diego venues, supporting acts like Tim Buckley , Sonny Terry , Brownie McGhee and his friend Jack Tempchin . Aware that San Diego offered little opportunity for career progression, Waits began traveling into Los Angeles to play at
11700-660: The Mirror: Crime Films and Society (2006) found that film scholars had a traditional reluctance to examine the topic of crime films in their entirety due to complex nature of the topic. Carlos Clarens in his book Crime Movies (1980), described the crime film as a symbolic representation of criminals, law, and society. Clarens continued that they describe what is culturally and morally abnormal and differ from thriller films which he wrote as being more concerned with psychological and private situations. Thomas Schatz in Hollywood Genres: Formulas, Filmmaking, and
11856-593: The Performance Artist Hall of Fame, but it was the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame that recognized the great Tom Waits." In accepting the award, Waits mused, "They say that I have no hits and that I'm difficult to work with. And they say that like it's a bad thing!" Thomas Alan Waits was born on December 7, 1949, in Pomona, California . He has one older and one younger sister. His father, Jesse Frank Waits,
12012-516: The Studio System (1981) does not refer to the concept of crime film as a genre, and says that "such seemingly similar "urban crime" formulas" such as the gangster film and detective film were their own unique forms. Thomas Leitch, author of Crime Films (2004) stated that the crime film presents their defining subject as a crime culture that normalizes a place where crime is both shockingly disruptive and completely normal. Rafter suggested
12168-577: The Thalia in December 1992. In early 1993, Brennan was pregnant with Waits's third child, Sullivan. He decided to reduce his workload so as to spend more time with his children; this isolation spawned rumours that he was seriously ill or had separated from his wife. For three years, he turned down all offers to perform gigs or appear in movies. However, he made several cameos and guest appearances on albums by musicians he admired. In February 1996, he held
12324-467: The Thalia, they began working on the project in Hamburg in early 1992. Waits characterized the songs he wrote for the play as "adult songs for children, or children's songs for adults". In his lyrics, Waits drew on his increasing interest in freak shows and the physically deformed. He thought the play itself was about "repression, mental illness and obsessive, compulsive disorders". Alice premiered at
12480-506: The U.S. He changed the setlist for each performance; most of the songs chosen were from his two Island albums. Returning to the U.S., he traveled to New Orleans to act in Jarmusch's Down by Law . Jarmusch wrote Down by Law with Waits and Lurie in mind. The film opened and closed with songs from Rain Dogs . Jarmusch noted that "Tom and I have a kindred aesthetic. An interest in unambitious people, marginal people." The pair developed
12636-482: The West Coast, getting as far as Denver . For Waits's second album, Geffen wanted a more jazz-oriented producer, selecting Bones Howe for the job. Howe recounts his first encounter with the young artist: "I told him I thought his music and lyrics had a Kerouac quality to them, and he was blown away that I knew who Jack Kerouac was. I told him I also played jazz drums and he went wild. Then I told him that when I
12792-461: The Window , Laura , Murder, My Sweet and Double Indemnity ushered in this film cycle. These works continued into the mid-1950s. A reaction to film noir came with films with a more semi-documentary approach pioneered by the thriller The House on 92nd Street (1945). This led to crime films taking a more realistic approach like Kiss of Death (1947) and The Naked City (1948). By
12948-462: The Year". Arion Berger wrote that "With Rain Dogs , he dropped his bedraggled lounge-piano act and fused outsider influences -- socialist decadence by way of Kurt Weill, pre-rock integrity from old dirty blues , the elegiac melancholy of New Orleans funeral brass -- into a singularly idiosyncratic American style...The music is bony and menacingly beautiful, the desultory electric-guitar solo as cold as
13104-479: The adrift and downtrodden, Mr. Waits creates three-dimensional characters who, even in their confusion and despair, are capable of insight and startling points of view. Their stories are accompanied by music that’s unlike any other in pop history.” Tom Waits was born and raised in a middle-class family in Pomona, California . Inspired by the work of Bob Dylan and the Beat Generation , he began singing on
13260-553: The albums Alice and Blood Money . Waits went on to release Real Gone (2004), the compilation Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards (2006), the live album Glitter and Doom Live (2009) and Bad as Me (2011). Waits has influenced many artists and gained an international cult following . His songs have been covered by Bruce Springsteen , Tori Amos , Rod Stewart and the Ramones and he has written songs for Johnny Cash and Norah Jones , among others. In 2011, he
13416-419: The best performance Waits ever gave as an actor." In 1991, Waits and his family moved to the outskirts of Sonoma . Waits's family later relocated to a secluded house near Valley Ford after a bypass road was built near to their first Sonoma County house. Also in 1991, 13 of Waits's 1971 pre-Asylum Records recordings were released for the first time on the first volume of Tom Waits: The Early Years . Waits
13572-486: The best way to skirt complexities of various films that may be defined as crime films as works that focus primarily on crime and its consequences, and that they should be viewed as a category that encompasses a number genres, ranging from caper films , detective films, gangster films, cop and prison films and courtroom dramas. She said that like drama and romance film, they are umbrella terms that cover several smaller more coherent groups. The criminal acts in every film in
13728-524: The body out of the motel in a garment bag. Before burying Nadine in a forest, Bob tells Dianne that he is going to get clean and begin a 21-day methadone treatment program. Shocked by Bob's decision, Dianne refuses to join him. Bob moves into a long-stay motel in Portland and gets a low-level manufacturing job. At the methadone clinic , he encounters an elderly, drug-addicted priest named Tom, whom Bob remembers from his days as an altar boy . Gentry pays
13884-601: The box office. The success of the film and its sequel The Godfather Part II (1974) reinforced the stature of the gangster film genre, which continued into the 1990s with films Scarface (1983), Once Upon a Time in America (1984), The Untouchables (1987), Goodfellas (1990) and Donnie Brasco (1997). Dirty Harry (1971) create a new form of police film, where Clint Eastwood 's performance as Inspector Callahan which critic Pauline Kael described as an "emotionless hero, who lives and kills as affectlessly as
14040-431: The character of Jimmy "Popeye" Doyle who Leitch described as a "tireless, brutal, vicious and indifferent" in terms of constraints of the law and his commanding officers. The film won several Academy Awards and was successful in the box office. This was followed in critical and commercial success of The Godfather (1972) which also won a Best Picture Academy Award and performed even better than The French Connection in
14196-426: The company. He signed to a smaller record label, Anti- , recently launched as an offshoot of the punk -label Epitaph Records . He described the company as "a friendly place". The president of Anti-, Andy Kaulkin , said the label was "blown away that Tom would even consider us. We are huge fans." Waits himself praised the label: "Epitaph is a label run by and for artists and musicians, where it feels much more like
14352-429: The continual breakdown and re-establishment of borders among criminals, crime solvers and victims, concluding that "this paradox is at the heart of all crime films." Rafter echoed these statements, saying crime films should be defined on the basis of their relationship with society. Leitch writes that crime films reinforce popular social beliefs of their audience, such as the road to hell is paved with good intentions ,
14508-422: The cover brought him and because he felt appreciated by a songwriter he admired. While on the set of One from the Heart , Waits encountered Kathleen Brennan , a young Irish-American woman working as an assistant story editor. The two had previously met while Waits was filming Paradise Alley . Waits would later describe this encounter with Brennan as "love at first sight"; they were engaged to be married within
14664-412: The crime film was following changing attitudes towards the law and the social order that criminals metaphorically reflect while most film were also no more explicitly violent or explicitly sexual than those of 1934. White Heat (1949) inaugurated a cycle of crime films that would deal with the omnipresent danger of the nuclear bomb with its theme of when being threatened with technological nightmares,
14820-554: The criminal psychology and are characterized by and emphasis on the crime unfolding often though montage and extended sequences. The genre is sometimes used interchangeable with the term "caper". The term was used for the more dramatic films of the 1950s, while in the 1960s, it had stronger elements of romantic comedy with more playful elements as seen in films like The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) and Topkapi (1964). Leitch described combining genres as problematic. Screenwriter and academic Jule Selbo expanded on this, describing
14976-680: The decade ended, the attitudes Hollywood productions had towards fictional criminals grew less straightforward and more conflicted. In 1935, Humphrey Bogart played Duke Mantee in The Petrified Forest (1936), a role Leitch described as the "first of Hollywood's overtly metaphorical gangsters." Bogart would appear in films in the later thirties: Angels with Dirty Faces (1938) and The Roaring Twenties (1939). Unlike actor James Cagney , whose appeal as described by Leitch "direct, physical, and extroverted", Bogart characters and acting suggested "depths of worldly disillusionment beneath
15132-519: The documentary Streetwise , about homeless youth in Seattle; it was another influence on the subjects of his next album. Rain Dogs was recorded at the RCA Studios in mid 1985. Musically, Waits called the album "kind of an interaction between Appalachia and Nigeria". Keith Richards played on several tracks; Richards later acknowledged Waits's encouragement of his debut solo album, Talk
15288-493: The early 1990s he took part in several charitable causes. In 1990 he contributed a song to the HIV/AIDS benefit album Red Hot + Blue and later appeared at a Wiltern Theater fundraising show for the victims of the 1992 Los Angeles riots . In August 1992, Waits released his tenth studio album, Bone Machine . Waits wanted to explore "more machinery sounds" with the album, reflecting his interest in industrial music . It
15444-401: The end of the decade, American critics such as Parker Tyler and Robert Warshow regarded Hollywood itself as a stage for repressed American cultural anxieties following World War II. This can be seen in films such as Brute Force , a prison film where the prison is an existential social metaphor for a what Leitch described as a "meaningless, tragically unjust round of activities." By 1950,
15600-517: The experience was tough and that he was drinking too much alcohol. In May, he embarked on his first tour of Europe, performing in London , Amsterdam , Brussels and Copenhagen . On his return to Los Angeles, he joined his friend Chuck E. Weiss , moving into the Tropicana motel in West Hollywood, which had an established reputation in rock music circles. Visitors noted his two-room apartment there
15756-499: The family home, a traumatic experience for the 10-year-old Waits. Alma took her children and relocated to Chula Vista , a middle-class suburb of San Diego . Jesse visited the family there, taking his children on trips to Tijuana . In nearby Southeast San Diego , Waits attended O'Farrell Community School , where he fronted a school band, the Systems, which he described as "white kids trying to get that Motown sound." He developed
15912-459: The filmmaker Jim Jarmusch . Starting in the mid-80s, Kurt Weill became an important influence on Waits's work. Bowman writes that "Waits had become interested in Weill’s late-1920s and 1930s musical-theater works... Weill’s slightly off-kilter, stylized cabaret approach to melody, rhythm, orchestration, and musical narrative permeated much of Waits’s subsequent work.” Waits did the soundtrack for
16068-462: The first leg of her European tour, but then ended his relationship with her. Her grief at the breakup was channeled into the 1981 album Pirates . In September, Waits moved to Crenshaw Boulevard to be closer to his father, before deciding to relocate to New York City. He initially lived in the Chelsea Hotel before renting an apartment on West 26th Street. On arriving in the city, he told
16224-536: The gangster films of the early 1930s were influenced by the early 1920s when cheap wood-pulp paper stocks led to an explosion in mass-market publishing. Newspapers would make folk heroes of bootleggers like Al Capone , while pulp magazines like Black Mask (1920) helped support more highbrow magazines such as The Smart Set which published stories of hard-edged detetives like Carroll John Daly 's Race Williams. The early wave of gangster films borrowed liberally from stories for early Hollywood productions that defined
16380-498: The genre has been popular since the dawn of the sound era of film. Ursini and Silver said that unlike the Western, the horror film, or the war film, the popularity of crime cinema has never waned. Tom Waits Thomas Alan Waits (born December 7, 1949) is an American musician, composer, songwriter, and actor. His lyrics often focus on society's underworld and are delivered in his trademark deep, gravelly voice. He began in
16536-412: The genre represents a larger critique of either social or institutional order from the perspective of a character or from the film's narrative at large. The films also depend on the audience ambivalence towards crime. Master criminals are portrayed as immoral but glamourous while maverick police officers break the law to capture criminals. Leitch defined this as a critical to the film as the films are about
16692-566: The genre with films like Little Caesar (1931), The Public Enemy (1931), and Scarface (1932). In comparison to much earlier films of the silent era, Leitch described the 1930s cycle as turning "the bighearted crook silent films had considered ripe for redemption into a remorseless killer." Hollywood Studio heads were under such constant pressure from public-interest groups to tone down their portrayal of professional criminals that as early as 1931. Jack L. Warner announced that Warner Bros. would stop producing such films. Scarface itself
16848-436: The group is responsible for the pharmacy robbery, raid and wreck their apartment in an unsuccessful search for the stolen drugs, which Dianne has buried outside. After moving to another apartment, Bob realizes that Gentry has the group under surveillance. Bob proceeds to devise an elaborate ruse which results in one of the policemen, Trousinski, being mistaken for a peeper by a neighbor who shoots and injures him. The next day,
17004-526: The growing rage against the establishment spilled into portrayal police themselves with films like Bullitt (1968) about a police officer caught between mob killers and ruthless politicians while In the Heat of the Night (1967) which called for racial equality and became the first crime film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture . The French Connection (1971) dispensed Bullitt ' s noble hero for
17160-572: The headline act before touring the East Coast; in New York City he met and befriended Bette Midler , with whom he had a sporadic affair. Back in Los Angeles, Cohen suggested Waits produce a live album . To this end, he performed two shows at the Record Plant Studio in front of a small invited audience to recreate the atmosphere of a jazz club . Again produced and engineered by Howe (as all his future Asylum releases would be), it
17316-511: The hostility from Zappa's fans. Waits joined Zappa's tour in Ontario , but like Dalton found the audiences hostile; while on stage he was jeered at and pelted with fruit. Although he liked the Mothers of Invention, he was intimidated by Zappa himself. Waits moved from Silver Lake to Echo Park , spending much of his time in downtown Los Angeles . In early 1974, he continued to perform around
17472-578: The jazz sound characteristic of his earlier work; it was his first album not to feature a saxophone and his first to feature the marimba . When the album was finished, he took it to Asylum, but they declined to release it. Waits wanted to leave the label; in his view, "They liked dropping my name in terms of me being a 'prestige' artist, but when it came down to it they didn't invest a whole lot in me in terms of faith". Chris Blackwell of Island Records learned of Waits's dissatisfaction and approached him, offering to release Swordfishtrombones ; Island had
17628-445: The law is above individuals, and that crime does not pay. The genre also generally has endings that confirm the moral absolutes that an innocent victim, a menacing criminal, and detective and their own morals that inspire them by questioning their heroic or pathetic status, their moral authority of the justice system, or by presenting innocent characters who seem guilty and vice-versa. Crime films includes all films that focus on any of
17784-405: The lyrics. They flew to Kansas to meet with Burroughs, who agreed to join the project. Waits traveled to Hamburg < germany, in May 1989 to work on the project, and was later joined there by Burroughs. The Black Rider debuted in Hamburg's Thalia Theater in March 1990. On completing its run at the Thalia, the play went on an international tour, with a second run of performances occurring in
17940-498: The main gangster Jody Jarrett fights fire with fire. These themes extended into two other major crime films by bring the issues down from global to the subcultural level: The Big Heat (1953) and Kiss Me Deadly (1955) which use apocalyptical imagery to indicate danger with the first film which the film persistently links to images of catastrophically uncontrolled power and the "traumatic consequences" of nuclear holocaust and Kiss Me Deadly literally features an atom bomb waiting in
18096-621: The mainstream Hollywood map as a character actor". In Fall 1987, Waits and his family left New York and returned to Los Angeles, settling on Union Avenue. He appeared as a hitman in Robert Dornhelm 's Cold Feet and lent his voice to Jarmusch's Mystery Train . Although Waits had provided a voice-over for a 1981 television advert for Butcher's Blend dog food, he objected to musicians letting companies use their songs in advertising; he said that "artists who take money for ads poison and pervert their songs". In November 1988, he brought
18252-710: The mid-2000s. In June 1989, Waits travelled to London to play a Punch and Judy puppeteer in Ann Guedes's film Bearskin: An Urban Fairytale . He proceeded to Ireland, where he was joined by Brennan and spent time with her family. In December 1989, he began a stint as Curly, a mobster's son, at the Los Angeles Theater Center production of Thomas Babe 's play Demon Wine . Over the next four years, he made seven film appearances. He nevertheless repeatedly told press that he did not see himself as an actor, but only as someone who did some acting. He made
18408-405: The only or first gangster film following the fall of the production code, The Godfather (1972) was the most popular and launched a major revival of the style. The film followed the themes of the genres past while adding new emphasis on the intricate world of the mafia and its scale and seriousness that established new parameters for the genre. The heist film, also known as the "big caper" film
18564-456: The rattle of marimbas in 'Clap Hands.' The evocative, elliptical rhymes describe scenes and characters with poetic precision but use atmosphere, not narrative, to connect them." NME named Rain Dogs the best album of the year. In September 1985, his son Casey was born. Waits assembled a band and went on tour, kicking it off in Scotland in October before proceeding around Europe and then
18720-585: The reason given was that Waits was appearing in another movie they were financing, although Van Sant has said he suspected the Oscar win of Kiss of the Spider Woman , a film they had also financed, had made them want a lead who could win an Oscar. Drugstore Cowboy was filmed mainly around Portland , Oregon , including an area in the Pearl District that used to be a railyard , with a viaduct going over it. The Lovejoy Columns , which formerly held up
18876-434: The release of the early gangster films following Little Caesar , which led to the 1935 Production Code Administration in 1935 ending its first major cycle. As early as 1939, the traditional gangster was already a nostalgic figure as seen in films like The Roaring Twenties (1939). American productions about career criminals became possible through the relaxation of the code in the 1950s and its abolition in 1966. While not
19032-412: The road to make him change his life, and he answers that Nadine's death, the hex she put on them, and the possibility of serious prison time contributed to his decision. He reveals a deal he made with a higher power: if he could get Nadine's body out of the motel, past the cops, and into the ground, he would straighten out his life. Bob suggests Dianne stay the night with him, but she declines, and gives Bob
19188-536: The silent era differed radically from the Hollywood productions, reflecting the post-World War I continental culture. Drew Todd wrote that with this, Europeans tended to create darker stories and the audiences of these films were readier to accept these narratives. Several European silent films go much further in exploring the mystique of the criminal figures. These followed the success in France of Louis Feuillade 's film serial Fantômas (1913). The average budget for
19344-534: The songs written for The Black Rider , and did so at Los Angeles's Sunset Sound Factory . The Black Rider was released in the fall of 1993. Waits and Wilson decided to collaborate again, this time on an operatic treatment of Lewis Carroll 's relationship with Alice Liddell , who had provided the inspiration for Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass . Again scheduled to premier at
19500-410: The success of Shaft (1971) which led to studios rushing to follow it's popularity with films like Super Fly (1972), Black Caesar (1973), Coffy (1973) and The Black Godfather (1974) The films were often derivations of earlier films such as Cool Breeze (1972), a remake of The Asphalt Jungle , Hit Man (1972) a remake of Get Carter (1971), and Black Mama, White Mama (1973)
19656-407: The three parties to a crime: criminal, victims, and avengers and explores what one party's relation to the other two. This allows the crime film to encompass films as wide as Wall Street (1987); caper films like The Asphalt Jungle (1950); and prison films ranging from Brute Force (1947) to The Shawshank Redemption (1994). Crime films are not definable by their mise-en-scene such as
19812-463: The time he was studying at Hilltop High School , he later related, he was "kind of an amateur juvenile delinquent," interested in "malicious mischief" and breaking the law. He later described himself as a "rebel against the rebels", eschewing the hippie subculture which was growing in popularity for the 1950s Beat generation , especially Jack Kerouac , Allen Ginsberg and William S. Burroughs . In 1968, at age 18, he dropped out of high school. He
19968-436: The tracks were recorded as duets with Crystal Gayle ; Waits had initially planned to duet with Midler but she proved unavailable. The film was released in 1982, to largely poor reviews. Waits makes a small cameo as a trumpet player in a crowd scene. Waits's soundtrack album was released by Columbia Records in 1982. Waits had misgivings about the album, thinking it over-produced. Humphries thought that working with Coppola
20124-469: The viaduct and feature outsider artwork , are featured in the movie. The initial drugstore scene was filmed at the Nob Hill Pharmacy on NW Glisan Street. The soundtrack includes songs that are contemporaneous with the film's setting, along with original music by Elliot Goldenthal . It is one of his earliest works; in it, he does not use an orchestra, but a whole range of instruments treated in
20280-450: The war in narratives, with exceptions of film like The Green Berets (1968). The crime film Bonnie and Clyde (1967) revived the gangster film genre and captured the antiestablishment tone and set new standards for onscreen violence in film with its themes of demonizing American institution to attack the moral injustice of draft. This increase of violence was reflected in other crime films such as Point Blank (1967). Leitch found
20436-489: The word-jazz of ‘Pasties and a G-String,’ and the tour-de-force tenor-sax-accompanied hucksterism of ‘ Step Right Up .’” He received growing press attention, being profiled in Newsweek , Time , Vogue and The New Yorker ; he had begun to accrue a cult following . He went on tour to promote the new album, backed by the Nocturnal Emissions ( Frank Vicari , Chip White and Fitz Jenkins). In reference to "Pasties and
20592-492: The world of film, acting in Paradise Alley (1978), where he met a young story editor named Kathleen Brennan . He composed the soundtrack for Francis Ford Coppola 's One from the Heart (1982) and made cameos in several subsequent Coppola films. In 1980, Waits married Brennan, split from his manager and record label, and moved to New York City . With Brennan's encouragement and frequent collaboration, he pursued
20748-452: The year. The album was Waits's first collaboration with David Hidalgo , who played accordion on "Cold, Cold Ground" and "Train Song". After its release, Waits toured North America and Europe, his last full tour for two decades. Two of these performances were the basis for Chris Blum's concert film Big Time (1988). Waits continued interacting and working with other artists he admired. He
20904-528: Was "broadly in step with the singer-songwriter school of the early 1970s"; Waits had wanted to create a piano-led jazz album although Yester had pushed its sound in a more folk-oriented direction. Buckley covered "Martha" on his album Sefronia later that year. An Eagles recording of "Ol' 55" on their album On the Border brought Waits further money and recognition, although he regarded their version as "a little antiseptic". To promote his debut, Waits and
21060-461: Was "so insecure when I started ... I was sweating buckets". Waits was nominated for the 1982 Academy Award for Original Music Score . Waits still contractually owed Elektra-Asylum another album, so took a break from Coppola's project to write an album that he initially called White Spades . He recorded the album in June; it was released in September as Heartattack and Vine . The album
21216-449: Was "the hat." While riding in the ambulance, Bob concludes via a voice-over that he has "paid his debt to the hat" and so can return to his former lifestyle without breaking his commitment. He is amused by the perceived irony of the police driving him to a hospital — "the fattest pharmacy in town." Tom Waits was Van Sant's first choice to play the lead, although the finance company would not support Van Sant if he had cast him. Officially
21372-645: Was "the record where Tom Waits radically reinvented himself and reshaped the musical landscape." NME named it the second best album of the year. In 1989, Spin magazine named it the second greatest album of all time. In 1983, Waits appeared in three more Coppola films: as Benny, a philosopher running a billboard store in Rumble Fish ; as Buck Merrill in The Outsiders ; and as the maître'd in The Cotton Club . He later said that "Coppola
21528-467: Was a Texas native of Scots-Irish descent, and his mother, Alma Fern (née Johnson), hailed from Oregon and had Norwegian ancestry. Alma, a regular church-goer, managed the household. Jesse taught Spanish at a local school and was an alcoholic; Waits later related that his father was "a tough one, always an outsider." They lived at 318 North Pickering Avenue in Whittier, California . He recalled having
21684-417: Was a great fan of The Pogues and went on a Chicago pub crawl with them in 1986. The following year, he appeared as a master of ceremonies on several dates of Elvis Costello 's "Wheel of Fortune" tour. At rehearsals, Tom Waits looked like any moment he might break at the waist or his head fall off his shoulders on to the floor. I once saw a small-town idiot walking across the park, totally drunk, but he
21840-402: Was a millionaire and it turned out I had, like, twenty bucks." Waits credited Brennan with introducing him to much new music, most notably Captain Beefheart , a key influence on the direction in which he wanted to take his music. He later said that "once you've heard Beefheart it's hard to wash him out of your clothes. It stains, like coffee or blood." She also introduced him to Harry Partch ,
21996-501: Was an avid watcher of Alfred Hitchcock Presents and The Twilight Zone . Another influence was the comedian Lenny Bruce . Waits worked at Napoleone's pizza restaurant in National City, California , and both there and at a local diner developed an interest in the lives of the patrons, writing down phrases and snippets of dialogue he overheard. He worked in the forestry service as a fireman for three years and served with
22152-672: Was an important move in Waits's career: it "led directly to Waits moving from cult (i.e. largely unknown) artiste to center-stage." Newly married and with his Elektra-Asylum contract completed, Waits decided that it was time to artistically reinvent himself. He wanted to move away from using Howe as his producer, although the two parted on good terms. With Brennan's help, he began the process of firing Cohen as his manager, with him and Brennan taking on managerial responsibilities themselves. He came to believe that Cohen had been swindling him out of much of his earnings, later relating that "I thought I
22308-537: Was angered at this, describing many of his early demos as "baby pictures" that he would not want released. A second volume with 13 more recordings from 1971 was released in 1993. In April 1992, Waits released the soundtrack album to Jarmusch's Night on Earth . Largely instrumental, it had been recorded at the Prairie Sun studio in Cotati . In 1992, Waits quit drinking alcohol and joined Alcoholics Anonymous . In
22464-527: Was critically well received and was his first release to break into the Billboard Top 100 Album List , peaking at 89. Per Bowman, Small Change "made it clear that Waits had evolved into a master storyteller, reflecting the influence of crime-noir writers such as Dashiell Hammett and John D. MacDonald . Arguably his first masterpiece, the album featured exquisite piano ballads such as ' Tom Traubert's Blues ' and ‘ The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me) ,’
22620-532: Was delayed for over a year as its director Howard Hughes talked with the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America 's Production Code Office over the films violence and overtones of incest. A new wave of crime films that began in 1934 were made that had law enforcers as glamourous and as charismatic as the criminals. J. Edgar Hoover , director the Bureau of Investigation (renamed
22776-448: Was far more widely reviewed than Closing Time had been. Waits himself later dismissed the album as "very ill-formed, but I was trying". After recording The Heart of Saturday Night , Waits reluctantly agreed to tour with Zappa again, but once more faced strong audience hostility. The kudos of having supported Zappa's tour nevertheless bolstered his image in the music industry and helped his career. In October 1974, he first performed as
22932-474: Was heavily cluttered. Waits told the Los Angeles Times that "You almost have to create situations in order to write about them, so I live in a constant state of self-imposed poverty". In July 1976, Waits recorded Small Change , again produced by Howe. He recalled it as a seminal episode in his development as a songwriter, the point when he became "completely confident in the craft". The album
23088-644: Was holding an ice-cream, staggering, but also concentrating on not allowing the ice-cream to fall. I felt there was something similar to Tom. — Jack Nicholson , Waits's co-star in Ironweed In 1986, he took a small part in Candy Mountain , as millionaire golf enthusiast Al Silk. He costarred in Hector Babenco 's Ironweed , as Rudy the Kraut. Hoskyns noted that Ironweed put Waits "on
23244-605: Was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame . Introducing him, Neil Young said: "This next man is indescribable, and I'm here to describe him. He's sort of a performer, singer, actor, magician, spirit guide, changeling... I think it's great that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has recognized this immense talent. Could have been the Motion Picture Hall of Fame, could have been the Blues Hall of Fame, could have been
23400-460: Was more guitar-based and had, according to Humphries, "a harder R&B edge" than any of its predecessors. It again broke into the Top 100 Album Chart, peaking at number 96. Reviews were generally good. Hoskyns called it "one of Waits's pinnacle achievements" as an album. One of its tracks, " Jersey Girl ", was subsequently recorded by Bruce Springsteen . Waits was grateful, both for the revenue that
23556-493: Was recorded in an old storage room at Prairie Sun. Waits recalled: "I found a great room to work in, it's just a cement floor and a hot water heater. Okay, we'll do it here. It's got some good echo." Eight of the album's tracks were co-written with Brennan. The cover was co-designed by Waits and Jesse Dylan . Jarmusch and Dylan directed videos for "I Don't Wanna Grow Up", and "Goin' Out West", respectively. Critic Steve Huey called it "perhaps Tom Waits's most cohesive album ...
23712-512: Was released as Nighthawks at the Diner in October 1975. The album cover and title were inspired by Edward Hopper 's Nighthawks (1942). He followed this with a week's residency at the Reno Sweeney nightclub, an off-Broadway–style club in New York City. In December he appeared on the PBS concert show Soundstage . From March to May 1976, he toured the U.S., telling interviewers that
23868-496: Was the cover star of free music magazine Music World . He began composing songs for his second album, and attended the Venice Poetry Workshop to try out this new material in front of an audience. Although Waits was eager to record this new material, Cohen instead convinced him to take over as a support act for Frank Zappa 's the Mothers of Invention after previous support act Kathy Dalton pulled out due to
24024-400: Was under intense social reform with cities rapidly expanding and leading to social unrest and street crime rising and some people forming criminal gangs. In this early silent film period, criminals were more prominent on film screens than enforcers of the law. Among these early films from the period is D.W. Griffith 's The Musketeers of Pig Alley (1912) involving a young woman hounded by
24180-461: Was unpublished. It was later published in 1990, by which time Fogle had been released from prison. Fogle, like the characters in his story, was a long-time drug user and dealer . The film was theatrically released in the United States on October 6, 1989, and received acclaim from critics. In 1971, 26-year-old Bob Hughes leads a nomadic group of drug addicts—his wife Dianne, his best friend Rick, and Rick's teenage girlfriend Nadine—who travel across
24336-428: Was working for Norman Granz , Norman had found these tapes of Kerouac reading his poetry from The Beat Generation in a hotel room. I told Waits I'd make him a copy. That sealed it." Recording sessions for The Heart of Saturday Night took place at Wally Heider's Studio 3 on Cahuenga Boulevard in Hollywood in April and May, with Waits conceptualizing the album as a sequence of songs about U.S. nightlife. The album
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