Jump to: Actor Trademark 1 Spoilers 4. As part of his contract, Marlon Brando only worked until every day and then would leave to go see his analyst. Brando's mother had recently died and the conflicted young actor was in therapy to resolve his issues with his parents. Interestingly, for the film's classic scene between Rod Steiger and Brando in the back of the cab, all of Steiger's close-ups were filmed after Brando had left for the day, so Brando's lines were read by one of the crew members.
For many years Steiger, who had actually stayed during Brando's close-ups to help him put in a better performance, remained very bitter that Brando didn't return the favor, and often mentioned it in interviews. He had Karl Malden direct a scene from the film with an up-and-coming fellow actor from the Actors Studio playing the Terry Malloy lead role.
They figured the competitive Brando would not be eager to see such a major role handed to some new screen heartthrob. The ploy worked, especially since the competition had come in the form of a guy named Paul Newman. In his autobiography, Marlon Brando revealed his initial thoughts about his performance. I thought I was a huge failure, and walked out without a word to him. I was simply embarrassed for myself.
The taxicab scene between Terry and Charlie, one of the most famous scenes in the cinema, was not improvised, as Marlon Brando claimed in his autobiography. When Brando did initially improvise during the shooting of the scene, and Rod Steiger followed his lead, Elia Kazan yelled, "Stop the shit, Buddy! The two actors stuck to Budd Schulberg 's script after that. The scene where Eva Marie Saint drops her glove and Marlon Brando picks it up and puts it on his hand was unplanned.
Saint dropped her glove accidentally in rehearsal and Brando improvised the rest. Elia Kazan loved the new business and asked them to repeat it for the take. It worked; she won the Oscar. The leading characters were based on real people: Terry Malloy was based on longshoreman and whistle-blower Anthony De Vincenzo; Father Barry was based on waterfront priest John M.
Corridan; Johnny Friendly was based on mobster Albert Anastasia. Sam Spiegel forgot to pay for rear-projection equipment, hence the reason why the cab where Marlon Brando and Rod Steiger play out the film's most famous scene has blinds.
Sam Spiegel sent the script to Marlon Brando and it came back with a refusal. Spiegel, however, had inserted small pieces of paper between the pages which were still in place when the script was returned to him, indicating that it hadn't been read.
While Spiegel continued to work on Brando, Frank Sinatra agreed to take on the role. I could've had class. I could've been a contender. Most of the solo shots of Rod Steiger during the famous taxicab scene were done after Marlon Brando had left for the day. Steiger was deeply hurt and annoyed at Brando's apparent rudeness, but used these emotions to add to his performance.
Arthur Miller was approached by Elia Kazan to write the screenplay, and did so, but later pulled it when the FBI and studio bosses required him to make the gangsters Communists. Marlon Brando 's Oscar for Best Actor was either lost or stolen.
The award did show up later when Brando was contacted by a London auction house, intending to sell the item. The 24 articles won him a Pulitzer Prize and were reinforced by the murder of a New York dock hiring boss, which woke America to the killings, graft and extortion that were endemic on the New York waterfront.
Budd Schulberg was captivated by the subject matter, devoting years of his life to absorbing everything he could about the milieu. He became a regular fixture on the waterfront, hanging out in West Side Manhattan and Long Island bars, interviewing longshoremen, union leaders and getting to know the outspoken priests from St. Xavier's in Hell's Kitchen. Thomas Handley , who played Terry Molloy's teenage friend Tommy, was hired by the production to feed the pigeons on set.
His father, a longshoreman, had been blackballed for anti-union activities, and disappeared when Hanley was four months old. Elia Kazan and Budd Schulberg had him audition for the role, and coaxed an angry response out of him by calling his father a rat.
He went on to become a longshoreman, and in was elected recording secretary of his union after yet another corrupt leadership was ousted.
What is less widely reported is that Kazan intended it as a direct attack at his former close friend Arthur Miller who had been openly critical of Kazan's actions. Specifically, it was a direct response to Miller's play "The Crucible. Eva Marie Saint 's character was supposed to be The actress was 30 years old at the time of the film's release. Elia Kazan later remarked that the biggest problem he encountered with his actors was getting them on set on time the weather was so cold, most of the actors didn't like to hang around the set for long.
Tony Galento , Tami Mauriello and Abe Simon , who play Johnny Friendly's heavies, were all former professional boxers and opponents of Joe Louis for the heavyweight world title. Simon fought the Brown Bomber twice and was knocked out in Round 13 in the first fight and Round 6 in the second.
Galento and Mauriello fought Louis once apiece and shared similar fates. Although Rod Steiger plays Marlon Brando 's older brother in the film, in real life, Brando was a year older than Steiger.
Movie symbolism. Hawks vs Pigeons. The entire move is a battle of John Friendly's Hawks vs the dock workers - pigeons. The beginning scene where Joey gets push off the roof. The Thugs hawks are on the roof top waiting for their prey - Joey the pigeon. Terry runs with the Hawks but is a pigeon from the onset. He raises pigeons, is seen several times in their cage or through the cage. On the dock the boss throws the tokens. All of the dock workers run after them bobbing up and down exactly the way pigeons go after seed when its thrown.
Terry even gives a speech about the town having Hawks and going after pigeons. There several more examples throughout the movie. Many real longshoremen from Hoboken, NJ--where much of the film was shot--were used as extras. Sam Spiegel was insistent on Budd Schulberg delivering a perfect screenplay and harassed the writer constantly with changes and suggestions. One night his wife awoke to find him shaving at in the morning. Father Barry finds him there, drunk and confused.
Terry curses at Father Barry, and Father Barry punches him. He tells Terry the only right thing to do is to testify against the corrupt union leaders, and Terry finally agrees. The next day Terry testifies to the commission in court. Tommy, the neighborhood kid, has killed all his pigeons. With all the longshoremen looking on, Terry calls Johnny Friendly out of his tiny shack and delivers an emotional speech announcing his new goal: to break away from mob rule toward independent thought.
A fight ensues between Terry and Friendly. Other goons restrain the longshoremen, who are not really making an effort to help anyway. Instead, they place all their hopes on Terry. Finally, Edie and Father Barry burst through and find Terry almost comatose, the water lapping at his body. Father Barry encourages Terry to stand in order to be a model of strength for the longshoremen. Terry rises without assistance, but he wobbles violently and squints through swollen eyes.
Finally, he manages to reach the hangar. All the longshoremen, truly inspired, follow their new leader. The director, Elia Kazan, has been praised by numerous publications for his Oscar winning film, On the Waterfront [1].
It would not do the film justice to simply watch it without analyzing all that Kazan had to offer. From the cinematography to the motifs, the film has much to admire and examine. The gritty docks, shadowed alleys and the unwelcoming industrial factories of Hoboken, New Jersey fit the bleak underworld of urban corruption. Furthermore, the filter used for this film is very suitable for this picture. Although more and more films started to be filmed in color during the fifties [2] , this film is more fitting in black and white.
It provides the movie a Noir-like aesthetic, especially considering all the urban corruption, street crime, and the classic trench-coated law enforcement that are in the story. Speaking of Noir, the film definitely associates itself with its mid-twentieth century era.
Out of date terminology is abundantly used throughout the film. Terms such as cheese-eater and Stoolie both contribute to the s ambiance. A pigeon is known to be a wild animal, but a stool pigeon is designed to deliver confidential messages, so they are cooped up animals.
The scene takes place in the back of a small cab. The camera frequently closes up on their faces, focusing on the constant emotional ups and downs of the two. Essentially, the camerawork and small setting lets the viewer focus on the interactions between the brothers. The confident and assertive, Charley, contradicts his own character. Throughout the scene, he fidgets with his gloves and cannot bring himself to make eye contact with Terry. As for Terry, he always seemed like a character pent up with sadness.
In this scene, he finally pours out his pent up grief to Charley, and as said before, blames his brother for the lackluster life he leads.
Meanwhile, the non-diegetic soundtrack was highly complementary. The music was melancholic and heart pumping at the same, letting the viewer both sympathize with Terry and feel his vigorous outpour of grief. Perhaps the most significant part of the scene is that even though Terry lets it all out, he knows his life is not fixed. Terry does in no way seem content after his talk with Charley.
The scene is an ode to the idea that an individual cannot blame their problems on someone else, they have to resolve their conflicts with action rather than look for a scapegoat. With the help of Father Barry, Terry was able to find a resolution to his problems.
Whiskey and beer are motifs that symbolize good relationships between characters. Once Terry is calmed down and convinced to bring down Friendly in court, the father orders two beers, one for him and Terry. This shows that the two characters are in agreement with each other. In contrast, this motif can symbolize disagreement. Earlier in the movie, Terry develops a strong liking towards Edie and wants that affection back, so he invites her to go drinking. The film uses beer again to represent the relationship between characters.
Edie does not finish the beer and leaves, showing that since the drink is not wanted, the characters are not in complete agreement with each other.
Motifs are a different way to understand the relationships between characters. The film is certainly not a simple work of cinema. Kazan constructed a movie that required effort from the viewer.
From beginning to end, the components of this film are in-depth as well as cleverly constructed. All of his directorial decisions gave the camera a point of view on the characters, and created an underlying symbolism, which promotes the plot.
When the movie first starts we see Terry on the street yelling up at Joey to come up to the roof. In this scene we see a low angle shot looking up at Joey in the window, and a high angle shot looking down on Terry. This idea of the camera looking up to characters that are not afraid to stand up to Johnny, and looking down on those who are scared into submission is continued throughout the film.
There are low angle shots looking up at Edie and the priest and high angle shots looking down on the men when they are on the docks waiting for work. He has decided to take a stand, and the camera angle changes to show this new perspective. The low angle shot on Terry, as he walks down the alley with a gun in this hand demonstrates that he is not going to sit deaf and dumb like he has thus far. In addition to the camera angle, the blocking also played a large role in demonstrating the emotional and moral state of the characters.
Whenever we see Terry with the mob, he is positioned so that his face is obstructed. There are multiple times when we can only see his back as the other characters move around him. This is demonstrated with the physical barrier of the gate on the pigeon coop.
Edie stands on one side of the fence while Terry stands on the other side. After Terry tells her the truth and has stood up to Johnny the barrier is removed. Edie goes to Terry on the roof after the trial and runs around the gate. Along with the symbolic positions of the characters, Kazan used animals and liquor as predominant symbols in this film.
The idea of a stool pigeon, someone who rats on someone else is at the foreground of this film. Joey was going to testify in court against the mob, and Terry uses the homing pigeon to lure him up to the roof. Dugan is then killed when the mob drops a case of Irish whisky on him, which symbolically represents that it was Father Barry, the Irish potato, who got him killed by making him stand up to the mob.
Music is another method, which Kazan used to promote the story. This is particularly evident in the classic scene where Terry and Charlie are talking in the car. Both Charlie and Terry are experiencing an internal conflict at this point in the film.
During this scene music starts to play while the two brothers reminisce about old times and what could have been. It is the first honest moment between them in the film and this same music returns when Terry finds Charlie in the alley.
Kazan used the music in these two scenes to create an emotional connection between his characters and his audience. Terry avoids making eye contact with Charlie and is soft spoken in comparison to other scenes where he is very confident. Throughout the entire film these men have been very rough, but we can see that they really are just little boys who long for the days when things were simpler.
Along with the deep symbolism throughout this film, Kazan made sure to stay true to the setting of his story. All of the costumes were very plain and you could tell that these people were suffering. This highlighted the cruelty of the mob in taking advantage of these hard workingmen. When we see Edie in the apartment with her father, it is cramped. The window curtains framing the scene demonstrate the smallness of the apartment.
By looking through one small window it is possible to see the entire apartment. The dialogue of the scene, particularly towards the end is indicative of the time and place. Unlike the priest, with his sermons, Terry is an average guy, which is what makes him the hero of this tale. On the Waterfront is a critically acclaimed movie directed by Elia Kazan and written by Budd Schulberg. Both Kazan and Schulberg wanted to go for a realistic, rough, gritty feel.
Schulberg uses dialogue composed of metaphors and images that represent different things to get his point across. The use of slang in this movie is used to make it more realistic. Pigeons are a reoccurring theme in the movie. Terry maintains a pigeon coop with a couple of younger boys.
He idolizes pigeons, saying that they have it easy. Unlike today, people in the s still harbored racism. Father Barry called himself a potato-eater to show the longshoremen that he is real, genuine, and has nothing to hide. Kazan put care into the location of the movie. This movie was shot on location in Hoboken to further add a gritty realism to the movie.
When Terry goes back to his apartment after testifying, there is a rip under the arm of his jacket. Most directors would want the rip fixed but Kazan choose not to, a decision that solidifies how much realism meant to Kazan. In the bar scenes and alley scenes, a lot of low key lighting was used to create shadows in order to add to the threatening air of the scene. And look at the famous scene between Terry and his brother, Charley Rod Steiger , in the back seat of a taxi.
But it still has its power to make us feel Terry's pain, and even the pain of Charley, who has been forced to pull a gun on his brother. Here is Kazan on Brando:. What other actor, when his brother draws a pistol to force him to do something shameful, would put his hand on the gun and push it away with the gentleness of a caress? The film was based on the true story of a longshoreman who tried to overthrow a corrupt union.
The film was shot on location in Hoboken, N. Brando plays a young ex-prizefighter, now a longshoreman given easy jobs because Charley is the right-hand man of the corrupt boss, Johnny Friendly Lee J.
After he unwittingly allows himself to be used to set up the death of Edie's brother, he starts to question the basic assumptions of his life--including his loyalty to Charley and Johnny, who after all ordered him to take a dive in his big fight in Madison Square Garden. The other major character is a priest Karl Malden , who tries to encourage longshoremen to testify against corruption. It would have been the high point of another kind of film, but against Brando's more sinuous acting, it feels like a set piece.
Eva Marie Saint makes a perfect foil for Brando, and the two actors have a famous scene in a bar where he reveals, almost indirectly, that he likes her, and she turns the conversation from romance to conscience.
0コメント