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129-458: On the Waterfront is a 1954 American crime drama film, directed by Elia Kazan and written by Budd Schulberg . It stars Marlon Brando , and features Karl Malden , Lee J. Cobb , Rod Steiger , Pat Henning and Eva Marie Saint in her film debut. The musical score was composed by Leonard Bernstein . The black-and-white film was inspired by "Crime on the Waterfront" by Malcolm Johnson ,

258-741: A 1963 film . In it, he describes his family as "alienated" from both their parents' Greek Orthodox values and from those of mainstream America. His mother's family were cotton merchants who imported cotton from England and sold it wholesale. His father had become a rug merchant after immigrating to the United States, and he expected his son would someday take over the family business. After attending public schools through high school, Kazan enrolled at Williams College in Massachusetts, where he helped pay his way by waiting tables and washing dishes; he still graduated cum laude. He also worked as

387-550: A "friendly witness" before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in 1952 at the height of the Hollywood blacklist . His decision to cooperate and name names brought him strong negative reactions from many friends and associates. His harshly anti-communist testimony "damaged if not shattered the careers of his former colleagues, Morris Carnovsky and Art Smith , both actors, and

516-471: A "more Brando-like" actor as Terry Malloy, to persuade producer Sam Spiegel that "an actor like Marlon Brando" could perform the role more forcefully than Sinatra. To that end, Malden filmed a screen test of Actors Studio members Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward performing the love scene between Terry and Edie. Persuaded by the Newman/Woodward screen test, Spiegel agreed to reconsider Brando for

645-480: A "prize that launched his career". The Group Theatre's summer rehearsal headquarters was at Pine Brook Country Club , located in the countryside of Nichols, Connecticut , during the 1930s and early 1940s. Along with Kazan were numerous other artists: Harry Morgan , John Garfield , Luise Rainer , Frances Farmer , Will Geer , Howard da Silva , Clifford Odets , Lee J. Cobb and Irwin Shaw . In 1940, Kazan had

774-416: 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

903-422: A bartender at various fraternities, but never joined one. While a student at Williams, he earned the nickname "Gadg", for Gadget, because, he said, "I was small, compact, and handy to have around." The nickname was eventually taken up by his stage and film stars. In America America he tells how, and why, his family left Turkey and moved to America. Kazan notes that much of it came from stories that he heard as

1032-478: 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

1161-505: 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

1290-575: 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),

1419-454: 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,

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1548-536: A few years earlier. Kazan writes of his decision: Each director has a favorite in his cast… my favorite this time was Zero Mostel… I thought him an extraordinary artist and a delightful companion, one of the funniest and most original men I'd ever met… I constantly sought his company… He was one of the three people whom I rescued from the "industry's" blacklist… For a long time, Zero had not been able to get work in films, but I got him in my film. In 1951, after introducing and directing Marlon Brando and Karl Malden in

1677-506: A fight at the request of mob boss Johnny Friendly. Terry now works for Friendly's labor union as a longshoreman while his older, more educated brother Charley is Friendly's right-hand man. Terry is coerced into luring fellow worker Joey Doyle onto a rooftop, where he believes Friendly's henchmen want to talk Joey out of testifying to the Waterfront Crime Commission . When they instead murder Joey by throwing him off

1806-484: 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

1935-619: A large supporting role as a flamboyantly dressed gangster in the boxing thriller City for Conquest starring James Cagney , Ann Sheridan and Anthony Quinn . His stylishly distinctive but raffish clothing seems to have been copied by Frank Sinatra a decade and a half later and his part is both sympathetic and extremely dramatic. In 1947, he founded the Actors Studio , a non-profit workshop, with actors Robert Lewis and Cheryl Crawford . In 1951, Lee Strasberg became its director after Kazan left for Hollywood to focus on his career as

2064-491: 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

2193-477: A long time. A lot of people, who don't understand how desperate people can get, advised me to cut it. When I am accused of being excessive by the critics, they're talking about moments like that. But I wouldn't take it out for the world. It actually happened. Believe me, if a Turk could get out of Turkey and come here, even now, he would kiss the ground. To oppressed people, America is still a dream. Before undertaking America America , Kazan wanted to confirm many of

2322-684: 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

2451-626: A movie director. It remained a non-profit enterprise. Strasberg introduced the " Method " to the Actors Studio, an umbrella term for a constellation of systemizations of Konstantin Stanislavski 's teachings. The "Method" school of acting became the predominant system of post-World War II Hollywood. Among Strasberg's students were Montgomery Clift , Mildred Dunnock , Julie Harris , Karl Malden , Patricia Neal , Maureen Stapleton , Eli Wallach , and James Whitmore . Kazan directed two of

2580-659: A professional stage actor. He continued his professional studies at the Juilliard School where he studied singing with Lucia Dunham . His first opportunity came with a small group of actors engaged in presenting plays containing "social commentary". They were called the Group Theatre , which showcased many lesser known plays with deep social or political messages. After struggling to be accepted by them, he discovered his first strong sense of self in America within

2709-535: 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

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2838-470: 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

2967-413: 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

3096-420: 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

3225-461: A seldom-discussed topic in America, antisemitism , for which he won his first Oscar as Best Director. In 1947, he directed the courtroom drama Boomerang! . In 1949 he again dealt with a controversial subject when he directed Pinky , which dealt with issues of racism in America, and was nominated for three Academy Awards. In 1950 he directed Panic in the Streets , starring Richard Widmark ,

3354-530: A series of articles published in November–December 1948 in the New York Sun which won the 1949 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting , but the screenplay by Budd Schulberg is directly based on his own original story. The film focuses on union violence and corruption among longshoremen , while detailing widespread corruption, extortion, and racketeering on the waterfronts of Hoboken, New Jersey . On

3483-530: A staged workplace accident. Terry's own unwillingness to testify is softened by his growing feelings for Edie and her and Father Barry’s pursuit of justice. He confesses his role in Joey's death to both. Shocked by this, Edie distances herself from him. Friendly sends Charley with a job offer to keep Terry quiet. Knowing refusal will get Terry killed, Charley urges him to comply. When Terry expresses regret about throwing his best fight and blames Charley for setting up

3612-506: A star in On the Waterfront . As a continuation of the socially relevant themes that he developed in New York, the film exposed corruption within New York's longshoremen's union. It too was nominated for twelve Academy Awards , and won eight, including Best Picture , Best Director , and Best Actor for Marlon Brando. On the Waterfront was also the screen debut for Eva Marie Saint , who won

3741-512: A thriller shot on the streets of New Orleans . In that film, Kazan experimented with a documentary style of cinematography, which succeeded in "energizing" the action scenes. He won the Venice Film Festival International Award as director, and the film also won two Academy Awards. Kazan had requested that Zero Mostel also act in the film, despite Mostel being "blacklisted" as a result of HUAC testimony

3870-399: A tiny dressing room   ... whereupon the director proceeded to justify himself for two hours." Beatty, years later, during a Kennedy Center tribute to Kazan, stated to the audience that Kazan "had given him the most important break in his career". Beatty's costar, Natalie Wood , was in a transition period in her career, having mostly been cast in roles as a child or teenager, and she

3999-554: A vital leader of the Group: He carried with him the aura of a prophet, a magician, a witch doctor, a psychoanalyst, and a feared father of a Jewish home… [H]e was the force that held the thirty-odd members of the theatre together, and made them permanent. Kazan's first national success came as a New York theatrical director. Although initially he worked as an actor on stage, and told early in his acting career that he had no acting ability, he surprised many critics by becoming one of

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4128-420: A young boy. He says during an interview that "it's all true: the wealth of the family was put on the back of a donkey, and my uncle, really still a boy, went to Istanbul… to gradually bring the family there to escape the oppressive circumstances… It's also true that he lost the money on the way, and when he got there he swept rugs in a little store." Kazan noted some of the controversial aspects of what he put in

4257-402: 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

4386-423: 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

4515-660: Is enormous." Orson Welles said "Kazan is a traitor [...] [but] he is a very good director". In 2010, Martin Scorsese co-directed the documentary film A Letter to Elia as a personal tribute to Kazan. Kazan was born in the Kadıköy district of Constantinople (now Istanbul), to Cappadocian Greek parents, originally from Kayseri in Anatolia . He arrived in the United States with his parents, Athena ( née  Shishmanoglou ) and George Kazantzoglou, on July 8, 1913. He

4644-446: Is regarded as one of the watershed moments in the history of movies. Through his portrayal of Terry Malloy, Brando popularized method acting and conclusively exemplified the power of Stanislavski-based approach in cinema. Praising Brando in 2004, director Martin Scorsese noted: "Everything that we know about the power of great screen acting relates back to him: when you watch his work in On

4773-640: 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

4902-482: The Criterion Collection . The 2013 Criterion Collection release presents the film in three aspect ratios: 1.66:1, 1.85:1, and 1.33:1. The accompanying booklet explains the reasoning behind this choice: "In 1953, Columbia Pictures was transitioning to the new widescreen format and declared that all its upcoming films, including On The Waterfront , would be suitable for projection in any aspect ratio from

5031-503: 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

5160-417: The Group Theatre in 1932, and co-founded the Actors Studio in 1947. With Robert Lewis and Cheryl Crawford , his actors' studio introduced " Method Acting " under the direction of Lee Strasberg . Kazan acted in a few films, including City for Conquest (1940). His films were concerned with personal or social issues of special concern to him. Kazan writes, "I don't move unless I have some empathy with

5289-1045: 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

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5418-495: 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

5547-546: The "family of the Group Theatre, and more loosely in the radical social and cultural movements of the time", writes film author Joanna E. Rapf. In Kazan's autobiography, he writes of the "lasting impact on him of the Group", noting in particular, Lee Strasberg and Harold Clurman as "father figures", along with his close friendship with playwright Clifford Odets . During an interview with Michel Ciment, Kazan described

5676-418: The "sages" of the film community declared her as "washed up" as an actress, although he still wanted to interview her for his next film: When I saw her, I detected behind the well-mannered 'young wife' front a desperate twinkle in her eyes   ... I talked with her more quietly then and more personally. I wanted to find out what human material was there, what her inner life was   ... Then she told me she

5805-612: 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

5934-689: 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

6063-596: 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

6192-498: 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

6321-522: 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

6450-794: 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

6579-460: The Group's most capable actors. In 1935 he played the role of a strike-leading taxi driver in a drama by Clifford Odets, Waiting for Lefty , and his performance was called "dynamic", leading some to label him the "proletarian thunderbolt". Among the themes that would run through all of his work were "personal alienation and an outrage over social injustice", writes film critic William Baer. Other critics have likewise noted his "strong commitment to

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6708-532: The Group: The Group was the best thing professionally that ever happened to me. I met two wonderful men. Lee Strasberg and Harold Clurman, both of whom were around thirty years old. They were magnetic, fearless leaders. During the summer I was an apprentice, they were entertaining in a Jewish summer camp   ... At the end of the summer they said to me: "You may have talent for something, but it's certainly not acting." Kazan also praised Strasberg as

6837-546: The HUAC. Kazan then replaced Miller with Budd Schulberg . Cobb's character of Johnny Friendly was partly modeled on Johnny Dio , a real-life mobster known for involvement in labor racketeering. According to Richard Schickel in his biography of Kazan, Marlon Brando initially declined the role of Terry Malloy, and Frank Sinatra (a native of Hoboken , where the film was being made) then had "a handshake deal" – but no formally signed contract – to play

6966-660: 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

7095-612: The North American box office in 1954. In his July 29, 1954, review, New York Times critic A. H. Weiler called the film "an uncommonly powerful, exciting, and imaginative use of the screen by gifted professionals". On Rotten Tomatoes , the film holds a score of 99% from 111 reviews, with an average rating of 9.2/10. The website's critics consensus reads, "With his electrifying performance in Elia Kazan's thought-provoking, expertly constructed melodrama, Marlon Brando redefined

7224-481: The Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her role. Saint recalls that Kazan selected her for the role after he had her do an improvisational skit with Brando playing the other character. She had no idea that he was looking to fill any particular film part, however, but remembers that Kazan set up the scenario with Brando which brought out surprising emotions: I ended up crying. Crying and laughing   ... I mean there

7353-516: 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

7482-678: The Studio's protégés, Karl Malden and Marlon Brando , in the Tennessee Williams play A Streetcar Named Desire . Though at the height of his stage success, Kazan turned to Hollywood as a director of motion pictures. He first directed two short films, but his first feature film was A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945), one of his first attempts to film dramas focused on contemporary concerns, which later became his forte. Two years later he directed Gentleman's Agreement , where he tackled

7611-401: The Waterfront ... you're watching the purest poetry imaginable, in dynamic motion". Kazan, the director of the film, would later write in his book, "If there is a better performance by a man in the history of film in America, I don't know what it is." Al Pacino , recounting his own memories on first seeing On the Waterfront , told Playboy in a 1979 interview that he concentrated more on

7740-490: The Waterfront that she "starts her real trip to fame". The film made use of extensive on-location street scenes and waterfront shots, and included a notable score by noted composer Leonard Bernstein . After the success of On the Waterfront , he went on to direct another screen adaptation of a John Steinbeck novel, East of Eden (1955). As director, Kazan again used another unknown actor, James Dean . Kazan had seen Dean on stage in New York and after an audition gave him

7869-547: The Waterfront was a critical and commercial success and is considered one of the greatest films ever made . It received twelve Academy Award nominations and won eight, including Best Picture , Best Actor for Brando, Best Supporting Actress for Saint, and Best Director for Kazan. In 1997, it was ranked by the American Film Institute as the eighth-greatest American movie of all time ; in AFI's 2007 list, it

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7998-461: 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

8127-421: The audience. As with Schulberg's earlier novel, the motivations of Father Barry are made more explicit, and the ending is less happy. It was revised in 1995 and lasted for only 8 performances, losing $ 2.6 million, a record on Broadway for a non-musical at the time. The Indian films Kabzaa (1988), Ghulam (1998) and Sudhandhiram (2000) are inspired by On the Waterfront . A 2009 British stage production

8256-441: The basic theme". His first such "issue" film was Gentleman's Agreement (1947), with Gregory Peck , which dealt with antisemitism in America . It received eight Oscar nominations and three wins, including Kazan's first for Best Director . It was followed by Pinky (1949), one of the first films in mainstream Hollywood to address racial prejudice against African Americans . A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), an adaptation of

8385-486: 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

8514-546: 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

8643-431: 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

8772-429: 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 ,

8901-412: 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,

9030-554: 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

9159-680: 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

9288-489: The details about his family's background. At one point, he sat his parents down and recorded their answers to his questions. He remembers eventually asking his father a "deeper question: 'Why America? What were you hoping for? ' " His mother gave him the answer, however: "A.E. brought us here." Kazan states that "A.E. was my uncle Avraam Elia, the one who left the Anatolian village with the donkey. At twenty-eight, somehow—this

9417-552: The difficulties Kazan had in turning Dean into a new star, noting how Dean was a controversial figure at Warner Bros. from the time he arrived. There were rumors that he "kept a loaded gun in his studio trailer; that he drove his motorcycle dangerously down studio streets or sound stages; that he had bizarre and unsavory friends." As a result, Kazan was forced to "baby-sit the young actor in side-by-side trailers", so he would not run away during production. Co-star Julie Harris worked overtime to quell Dean's panic attacks. In general, Dean

9546-454: The docks, workers' slum dwellings, bars, littered alleys, and rooftops. The church used for exterior scenes in the film was the historic Our Lady of Grace , built in 1874, while the interiors were shot at the Church of St. Peter and St. Paul at 400 Hudson Street. Upon its release, the film received positive reviews from critics, and was a commercial success, earning an estimated $ 4.2 million at

9675-401: 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,

9804-423: The event. Kazan influenced the films of the 1950s and 1960s with his provocative, issue-driven subjects. Director Stanley Kubrick called him, "without question, the best director we have in America, [and] capable of performing miracles with the actors he uses." Film author Ian Freer concludes that even "if his achievements are tainted by political controversy, the debt Hollywood—and actors everywhere—owes him

9933-525: The film one of Kazan's most accomplished works. James Dean died the following year, at the age of 24, in an accident with his sports car about 200 miles north of Los Angeles. He had only made three films, and the only completed film he ever saw was East of Eden . In 1961, Kazan introduced Warren Beatty in his first screen appearance with a starring role in Splendor in the Grass (1961), with Natalie Wood ;

10062-702: The film was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress , and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry . In 1995, it made it on the Vatican's list of 45 important films . American Film Institute recognition The first home video release of the film was by Columbia Pictures Home Entertainment in 1982, on VHS and Beta. RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video later re-released it in 1984, 1986, and 1990, respectively,

10191-420: The film was nominated for two Oscars and won one. Author Peter Biskind points out that Kazan "was the first in a string of major directors Beatty sought out, mentors or father figures from whom he wanted to learn." Biskind notes also that they "were wildly dissimilar—mentor vs. protégé, director vs. actor, immigrant outsider vs. native son. Kazan was armed with the confidence born of age and success, while Beatty

10320-479: The film: "I used to say to myself when I was making the film that America was a dream of total freedom in all areas." To make his point, the character who portrays Kazan's uncle Avraam kisses the ground when he gets through customs, while the Statue of Liberty and the American flag are in the background. Kazan had considered whether that kind of scene might be too much for American audiences: I hesitated about that for

10449-564: The first week of shooting, where Beatty was angered at something Kazan said: "The star lashed out at the spot where he knew Kazan was most vulnerable, the director's friendly testimony before the HCUA. He snapped, 'Lemme ask you something—why did you name all those names? ' " Beatty recalled the episode: "In some patricidal attempt to stand up to the great Kazan, I arrogantly and stupidly challenged him on it." Biskind relates how "Kazan grabbed his arm, asking, 'What did you say?' and dragged him off to

10578-435: The fix, Charley hands him a gun and tells him to run. Terry finds Edie and they kiss. After hearing someone in the street, they find Charley murdered. Determined to kill Friendly, Terry is convinced by Father Barry to instead testify in court. Following the hearing, Friendly loses his powerful connections and faces indictment . When he is excluded from the next hiring call at the harbor, Terry confronts Friendly together with

10707-415: The full frame of 1.33:1 to the then widest standard of 1.85:1. The customary frame of European cinematographer Boris Kaufman ( Twelve Angry Men , Baby Doll ) split the difference at 1.66:1, so that all that was required was for him to leave extra room at the top and bottom of the frame and make sure that nothing essential would be lost in the widescreen presentation. At its premiere in 1954, On The Waterfront

10836-536: 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

10965-513: 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. Elia Kazan Elias Kazantzoglou ( Greek : Ηλίας Καζαντζόγλου , IPA: [iˈli.as kazanˈdzoɣlu] ; September 7, 1909 – September 28, 2003), known as Elia Kazan ( / ˈ iː l i ə k ə ˈ z æ n / EE -lee-ə kə- ZAN ),

11094-412: 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

11223-566: 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

11352-526: 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

11481-577: The latter being a part of the Columbia Classics line-up. Columbia TriStar later reissued the film on VHS in 1995 as part of the line-up's "Studio Heritage Collection", and the first DVD version was released in 2001. Among the special features is the featurette "Contender: Mastering the Method", a video photo gallery, an interview with Elia Kazan, an audio commentary, filmographies, production notes, and theatrical trailers. The film has been added to

11610-445: 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

11739-428: The lead actor than the film itself, "I couldn't move. I couldn't leave the theatre. I'd never seen the like of it." Anthony Hopkins said, "When you see Brando in the famous cab scene in On the Waterfront , it's still breathtaking." In a eulogy for Brando, Jack Nicholson described his display "probably the height of any age", and added that, "You just couldn't take your eyes off the guy. He was spellbinding." In 1989,

11868-498: 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

11997-405: 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

12126-415: The other workers, saying that he is proud of testifying and no longer betraying himself. After seeing Terry get beaten severely by Friendly’s thugs, the longshoremen refuse to work without him and renounce Friendly, wishing to run the union "on the up-and-up". Encouraged by Edie and Father Barry, Terry stumbles to the warehouse. The men follow him inside and the door closes, leaving Friendly outside, ignored by

12255-404: The part, even attending an initial costume fitting. But Kazan still favored Brando for the role, partly because casting Brando would assure a larger budget for the picture. While Brando's agent, Jay Kanter, attempted to persuade Brando to change his mind, Kazan enlisted actor Karl Malden, whom Kazan considered more suited to a career as a director than as an actor, to direct and film a screen test of

12384-452: The picture. Cohn agreed in principle to make The Hook , but there were concerns about the portrayal of corrupt union officials. When Cohn asked that the antagonists be changed to Communists, Miller refused. Cohn sent a letter telling Miller it was interesting he had resisted Columbia's desire to make the movie "pro-American". Kazan asked Miller to rewrite the script; Miller declined due to his disenchantment with Kazan's friendly testimony before

12513-506: The play because we'd lost all the compression. In the play, these people were trapped in a room with each other. What I actually did was to make the set smaller. As the story progressed… the set got smaller and smaller. Kazan's next film was Viva Zapata! (1952) which also starred Marlon Brando. This time the film added real atmosphere with the use of location shots and strong character accents. Kazan called this his "first real film" because of those factors. In 1954 he again used Brando as

12642-500: The playwright Clifford Odets ." In his memoirs, Kazan writes that he and Odets had made a pact at the time to name each other in front of the committee. Kazan later justified his actions by saying he took "only the more tolerable of two alternatives that were either way painful and wrong." Nearly a half-century later, his 1952 HUAC testimony continued to cause controversy. When Kazan was awarded an honorary Oscar in 1999, dozens of actors chose not to applaud as 250 demonstrators picketed

12771-487: The possibilities of acting for film and helped permanently alter the cinematic landscape". On Metacritic , the film holds a weighted average score of 91 out of 100 based on 15 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". Gaining the Academy Award for Best Actor and being named the greatest and second-greatest film performance of all time by Aaron West of Criterion and by Premiere respectively, Brando's performance

12900-434: 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

13029-513: The role, and shortly afterward, Kanter convinced Brando to reconsider his refusal. Within a week, Brando signed a contract to perform in the film. At that point, a furious Sinatra demanded to be cast in the role of Father Barry, the waterfront priest. It was left to Spiegel to break the news to Sinatra that Malden had been signed for this role. On the Waterfront was filmed over 36 days on location in various places in Hoboken, New Jersey , including

13158-401: The roof, Terry confronts Friendly, but is threatened and bribed into acquiescence. Joey's sister Edie and priest Father Barry try to inspire the dockworkers to stand up to Friendly. Terry attends the meeting as a snitch, but when it is violently broken up by Friendly's men, he helps Edie escape and misses Father Barry convincing one worker to testify. After the testimony, the worker is killed in

13287-435: The screen; but it seemed impossible that it was the same person in the room. Ray felt Dean was shy and totally withdrawn as he sat there hunched over. "Dean himself did not seem to believe it", notes Rathgeb. "He watched himself with an odd, almost adolescent fascination, as if he were admiring someone else." The film also made good use of on-location and outdoor scenes, along with effective use of early widescreen format, making

13416-536: 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

13545-447: The social and social psychological—rather than the purely political—implications of drama". By the mid-1930s, when he was 26, he began directing a number of the Group Theatre's plays, including Robert Ardrey 's well-known play Thunder Rock . In 1942 he achieved his first notable success by directing a play by Thornton Wilder , The Skin of Our Teeth , starring Tallulah Bankhead and Fredric March . The play, though controversial,

13674-527: The stage play which he had also directed, received twelve Oscar nominations, winning four, and was Marlon Brando 's breakthrough role. Three years later, he directed Brando again in On the Waterfront , a film about union corruption on the New York harbor waterfront. It also received twelve Oscar nominations, winning eight. In 1955, he directed John Steinbeck 's East of Eden , starring James Dean . A turning point in Kazan's career came with his testimony as

13803-491: The stage version, he went on to cast both in the film version of the play, A Streetcar Named Desire , which won four Oscars and was nominated for twelve. Despite these plaudits, the film was considered a step back cinematically with the feel of filmed theater; though Kazan did at first use a more open setting, he then felt compelled to revert to the stage atmosphere to remain true to the script. He explains: On "Streetcar" we worked very hard to open it up, and then went back to

13932-552: The starring role along with an exclusive contract with Warner Bros. Dean flew back to Los Angeles with Kazan in 1954, the first time he had ever flown in a plane, bringing his clothes in a brown paper bag. The film's success introduced James Dean to the world and established him as a popular actor. He went on to star in Rebel Without a Cause (1955), directed by Kazan's friend Nicholas Ray , and then Giant (1956), directed by George Stevens . Author Douglas Rathgeb recounts

14061-410: 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)

14190-407: 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

14319-450: 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

14448-589: The workers and shippers. The film is widely considered to be Elia Kazan 's answer to those who criticized him for identifying eight Communists in the film industry before the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) in 1952. One of Kazan's critics was his friend and collaborator, the noted playwright Arthur Miller , who had earlier written the first version of the script, originally titled The Hook . Kazan had agreed to direct it, and in 1951 they met with Harry Cohn at Columbia Pictures about making

14577-518: Was a critical and commercial success and won Wilder a Pulitzer Prize . Kazan won the New York Drama Critics Award for Best Director and Bankhead for best actress. Kazan then went on to direct Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller , and then directed A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams , both of which were also successful. Kazan's wife, Molly Thacher, the reader for the Group, discovered Williams and awarded him

14706-402: Was about eight years old, the family moved to New Rochelle, New York , and his father sent him to a Roman Catholic catechism school because there was no Orthodox church nearby. As a young boy, he was remembered as being shy, and his college classmates characterized him as more of a loner. Much of his early life was portrayed in his autobiographical book, America America , which he made into

14835-628: Was an American film and theatre director, producer, screenwriter and actor, described by The New York Times as "one of the most honored and influential directors in Broadway and Hollywood history". Born in Constantinople (now Istanbul) to Cappadocian Greek parents, his family came to the United States in 1913. After attending Williams College and then the Yale School of Drama , he acted professionally for eight years, later joining

14964-401: Was being psychoanalyzed. That did it. Poor R.J. [Wagner, Wood's husband], I said to myself. I liked Bob Wagner , I still do. Kazan cast her as the female lead in Splendor in the Grass , and her career rebounded. Finstad feels that despite Wood never receiving training in Method acting techniques, "working with Kazan brought her to the greatest emotional heights of her career. The experience

15093-532: 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

15222-900: Was directed by Steven Berkoff , who also played Johnny Friendly, with Simon Merrells as Terry. It played at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket in London, after the Nottingham Playhouse and the Edinburgh Festival Fringe . Crime drama 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

15351-529: Was exhilarating but wrenching for Natalie, who faced her demons on Splendor ." She adds that a scene in the film, as a result of "Kazan's wizardry   ... produced a hysteria in Natalie that may be her most powerful moment as an actress." Actor Gary Lockwood , who also acted in the film, felt that "Kazan and Natalie were a terrific marriage, because you had this beautiful girl, and you had somebody that could get things out of her." Kazan's favorite scene in

15480-586: Was named after his paternal grandfather, Elia Kazantzoglou. His maternal grandfather was Isaak Shishmanoglou. Elia's brother, Avraam, was born in Berlin and later became a psychiatrist. Kazan was raised in the Greek Orthodox Church and attended Greek Orthodox services every Sunday, where he had to stand for several hours with his father. His mother read the Bible but did not go to church. When Kazan

15609-415: Was now hoping to be cast in adult roles. Biographer Suzanne Finstad notes that a "turning point" in her life as an actress was upon seeing the film A Streetcar Named Desire : "She was transformed, in awe of Kazan and of Vivien Leigh's performance   ... [who] became a role model for Natalie." In 1961, after a "series of bad films, her career was already in decline", notes Rathgeb. Kazan writes that

15738-475: Was oblivious to Hollywood's methods, and Rathgeb notes that "his radical style did not mesh with Hollywood's corporate gears". Dean was amazed at his own performance on screen when he later viewed a rough cut of the film. Kazan had invited director Nicholas Ray to a private showing, with Dean, as Ray was looking for someone to play the lead in Rebel Without a Cause . Ray watched Dean's powerful acting on

15867-399: Was projected at 1.85:1. Over subsequent decades, millions of television viewers became accustomed to seeing the film with the open-matte 1.33:1 framing, a presentation that has carried over into the home video era. Here, for the first time, Criterion is presenting the film in all three aspect ratios so that viewers can compare and choose the version they prefer." In the same year that the film

15996-431: Was ranked 19th. It is Bernstein's only original film score not adapted from a stage production with songs. In 1989, On the Waterfront was one of the first 25 films to be deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry . New York prize fighter Terry Malloy's career was cut short when he purposely lost

16125-505: Was released, Budd Schulberg published a novel simply entitled Waterfront based on his script. In the novel Terry Malloy dies. It is more heavily focused on the priest who stands up to the mob, and narrated in first person by him. In 1984, the film script was adapted to stage by Schulberg, opening on Broadway in November. It had several technical innovations for the time, including lasers, filmlike scenic dissolves and sounds that enveloped

16254-435: Was such an attraction there   ... That smile of his   ... He was very tender and funny   ... And Kazan, in his genius, saw the chemistry there. Life magazine described On the Waterfront as the "most brutal movie of the year" but with "the year's tenderest love scenes", and stating that Saint was a "new discovery" in films. In its cover story about Saint, it speculated that it will probably be as Edie in On

16383-482: Was the wonder—he made his way to New York. He sent home money and in time brought my father over. Father sent for my mother and my baby brother and me when I was four." Kazan writes of America America , "It's my favorite of all the films I've made; the first film that was entirely mine." In 1932, after spending two years at the Yale University School of Drama, he moved to New York City to become

16512-400: 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

16641-541: Was virtually aflame with the arrogance of youth." Kazan later recorded his impressions of Beatty: Warren—it was obvious the first time I saw him—wanted it all and wanted it his way. Why not? He had the energy, a very keen intelligence, and more chutzpah than any Jew I've ever known. Even more than me. Bright as they come, intrepid, and with that thing all women secretly respect: complete confidence in his sexual powers, confidence so great that he never had to advertise himself, even by hints. Biskind describes an episode during

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