After reading The Contender, I've been on real Brando kick lately -- and today I revisited one of his best films -- On the Waterfront. Brando's performance in this film is the stuff of legend and rightly so, he's so moving in the role of Terry Malloy a failed boxer turned unwitting enforcer for the mob, that it elevates a film that is to this day problematic.
The movie was the work of two undeniably great artists -- director Elia Kazan and writer Budd Schulberg -- both of whom betrayed friends and colleagues by naming names of suspected or confirmed Communists before blatantly un-democratic House committees.
One could argue they had no choice, but plenty of other courageous people in Hollywood chose not to, with some paying a terrible price from an unofficial blacklist. While Kazan was a liberal (and for that matter so was Brando) he never expressed regret or remorse for what he did (again, while some of his peers -- like the great actor Sterling Hayden, did). Instead, he made this film -- which is very heavy handed in its moralizing of what some consider an unconscionable act.
The film's hero is lionized -- in a Christ-like way -- for having the guts to eventually turn on his corrupt longshoreman benefactors -- and to testify about their criminality. And in the context of the film his actions are unmistakably noble and justified.
Schulberg and Kazan tried for years to suggest that they were in no way drawing a parallel to their own testimony but clearly that's a crock. So what do with this film?
On the merits of the performances alone -- besides Brando doing phenomenal work, the stacked cast features unforgettable performances from Eva Marie Saint, Rod Steiger, Lee J. Cobb and Karl Malden, all of whom I believe were Oscar nominated.
Knowing the context of how this film was made and by whom is vital -- but this is a case where a film's politics don't necessarily jibe with my own and yet I can still appreciate and even love the movie.
That's not always possible, for me at least. For instance, Michael Bay's Benghazi film -- 13 Hours -- could be the most kinetic action film in the world, I'd never get over how historically irresponsible it is. Zero Dark Thirty on the other hand, which is somewhat ambiguous about the efficacy of torture, is still a phenomenal film in my estimation.
Another movie like this that comes to mind is 1978's The Deer Hunter. It's one of my favorite films of its era -- but it bears almost no relationship to the reality of the Vietnam War. The Vietnamese have no humanity in the film and the central conceit of underground Russian roulette games has been roundly debunked. But as a purely emotional experience and great storytelling -- the movie is a masterpiece -- if albeit, a problematic one.
Then there are the mainstream exploitation movies Dirty Harry and Death Wish. These films really wear their fascistic tendencies on their sleeve, although I'd argue that both films are somewhat more sophisticated about it's antiheroes than meets the eye. They work to this day because they are in part of a reflection of the times in which they were made -- where paranoia about crime in the cities was reaching a fever pitch.
I don't condone their message -- or the conspicuous presence of almost exclusively black men in the roles of antagonist criminals, with next to no nuance. These movies entertain me in spite of themselves and in part because they could only justifiably exist in 1971 and 1974 respectively.
One of my all-time favorite films -- Taxi Driver -- is also the most complex on this question. Scorsese is clearly a humanist, if you look at the essence of most of his films but Taxi Driver is probably his most nihilistic vision. We clearly are not meant to agree with De Niro's Travis Bickle but we are expected to emphasize for him and we do thanks to De Niro's performance and Scorsese's direction -- but the film does present some starkly troubling content without necessarily passing judgement on it.
It leaves it to its audience to process a scene like the one where Bickle murders a black thief in a convenience store. The crime the youth is committing is far from ideal, but also totally unworthy of death and of course everyone in the scene -- including the owner of the store who savagely beats that already dead corpse of the thief -- are broken, unstable people. All of this fascinates me.
Even though i identify as a liberal progressive -- I feel like films -- good films -- can traverse politics that are appalling to me and still engage me because of their nuances. Unfortunately, in real life, the other side lacks this kind of complexity.
There's nothing to unpack with Ted Cruz. Except maybe a little subconscious self hatred. He'd make for a terrible subject for a film.
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