Why Were Gangster Films So Popular in the 1930s - Essay Example

? GANGSTER MOVIES: WHY WERE THESE SO POPULAR? (The Motion Picture Production by: ID Number of Presented Professor's Name Name of University School Location Estimated Word Count: 2,169 Due on: March 15, 2012 Introduction Man is a social animal and part of being that is to have social contacts with other humans. In this regard, people look for ways to spend their time productively and at times, spend time in a leisurely fashion. This latter proclivity is to have some form of entertainment to while away the hours and pass the time so as not to get bored. There are a myriad ways to get entertained such as the travelling shows, circuses and clowns of olden times to the modern video films. A good part of modern entertainment was the rise of Hollywood which cranked out a fair good number of films each year and distributed worldwide for a global audience. There are quite a number of regional film centres as well, such as the copycats of Bollywood, Arabic films of the Middle East, Asian films (Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Thai, etc.) and European films too. These films tackle a wide variety of subjects and topics, almost anything under the sun, only subject to some restraints concerning what is decent and of good morals. Pornography was in the early years of the film industry not that prevalent yet, due to the social mores back then. It is quite different today, where various media are freely accessible, such as Internet and DVD. What is decent and acceptable in films can vary within societies over time as values changed. This is why the popularity of certain film genres wax and wane over time, too. Some of the more popular film genres are action, drama, comedy, horror, adventure, epic and others like musicals, science fiction, war, Westerns, and crime and gangster. This last genre is sometimes of particular interest to movie goers and censors alike because they can portray the real-life stories of criminals and gangsters. This particular genre can be realistic enough when trying to show how criminals lived, do their trade and what they do with their loot. Portrayals can be too realistic for comfort when violence is shown on screen. Gangster films enjoyed its own period of popularity like other film trends in which audiences express their preferences. This paper examines why gangster films became so popular and the backlash that resulted in which the film industry adopted guidelines for film makers to abide by, its own code. Discussion The film industry was born when photography was invented and the film makers were able to project their pictures on the wide screen. The earlier films were silent films as it did not have any sound in them. The sound came later on when the phonograph was invented; prior to that, the dialogue was shown on the bottom portion of the film clips as text in which the film goers read what was written in order to make sense of the film's story. The film industry provided a welcome respite from the drabness of ordinary lives of ordinary people. It provided a cheap form of entertainment by which the audience can re-live their fantasies. The early films that were made were not overly realistic in their portrayals of life. Rather, the new film industry enticed audiences by glorying certain aspects and magnifying their expectations. Films were the new forms of escapism and quite cheap to view them, often with proven story lines that were hackneyed and repeated several times over but people welcomed this new medium. But later on, major studios had to contend with the rise of independents (Nowell, 2011:30). Film genres can evolve into several sub-genres as the film industry developed in response to audience preferences. Horror films, for example, have the sub-genres of serial killers, slasher films, teen terror, satanic, science-related like Frankenstein or Dracula, torture and sadism. Its main appeal was to frighten an audience by preying on a person's worst hidden fears. It is the same with crime and gangster films in which the storyline revolves around criminals, sinister mobsters; included are underworld figures, bank robbers and murderous hoodlums. Like the horror films, gangster films were a cash-cow for film producers and investors. The revenues were usually assured as these films cater to a particular segment of the population, the males. Gangster films overlap with other genres like film-noir (black films that show angst or ennui) and mystery or suspense films (detective stories), which together portray the darker sides of life. Gangster films show how these criminals survived by operating outside the law. Popularity – gangster films became widely popular due to their realistic portrayal of the lives and adventures of criminals. Gangster films were a welcome diversion from the usual fare of dramas, comedies, musicals, wars and Westerns which film audiences had gotten tired of. In particular, the rise of gangster films as a distinct genre coincided with two seminal events in the history of the United States of America and the film industry in particular. Two watershed events were the development of sound in films and the Great Depression when people wanted tp watch films to forget their troubles. A further boost to their popularity was the founding of Las Vegas in the Nevada desert. These two events were related to the extreme uncertainty in the film industry's dynamics or in today's lingo, its business model. The film industry, in the real and figurative sense, was chaotic and every film producer needs a blockbuster to stay in business and survive; alternative to failure is a worthless roll of film; most films have short lives (Vany, 2004:46). The realistic gangster films provided a new source of revenue. Film producers and directors stumbled on this genre which proved to be a sufficient formula. Audiences were enthralled and mesmerized by this new film genre which had social realism, or in other words, the story line was derived almost direct from the newspaper headlines. The people saw a gangster film in which there was an almost instant empathy, something to which they can profoundly relate to. These films glorified gangsters, who rose above their own type of limitations by breaking the law, fight the legal and police authorities, amass a fortune and lived glamorous lives. For most audiences, gangster films depicted the kind of lifestyles they had aspired to, living the good life and achieving the American dream with fabulous wealth. This film genre was popular because it resonated deeply with the general American populace, with people dislocated by the unprecedented Great Depression of 1930s. Most of the gangster characters were shown in films as heroes or victims of a bad system, instead of being public enemies. Cinema represented current popular cultural attitudes (Shannon, 2005:48). Production Code (known as the Hays Code of 1930) – the sheer popularity of gangster film genre generated some concerns and there was a backlash against films which are in the main the cheapest form of mass entertainment that had deep influences on society in the whole in terms of morals and personal values. Film producers know their motion pictures have a mass universal appeal and in this regard, have recognized their responsibility in shaping the values which govern any civilized society. Films as a new media for entertainment can influence the people who see the films, in one way or another, whether consciously or not, wittingly or not. The gangster films were singled out among other film genres because their realistic portrayals were too realistic for comfort for some, who see the films as a threat to spiritual values, social morals, correct thinking and an ideal lifestyle. Although admittedly just entertainment, these films in a way presented some negative aspects in terms of cultural and social influences. The Production Code was a form of industry self-restraint and self-censorship. The films that were made after this period were somehow “sanitized” by disallowing certain scenes in films, such as not showing anything that will lower moral standards, glorify only correct or ethically prescribed ways of living and not depict sin, evil or wrongdoing in the guise of entertainment. The sudden and unexpected popularity of gangster films provided the investors in films a new way to safeguard their investments, in an industry that is considered very risky due to movie audiences' fickleness in terms of preferences; it provided safe returns and big profits. The code became necessary in order to preserve the wholesome entertainment associated with films; a proven formula like gangster films caused a mad rush among studios to make them in such a way as they tried to outdo each other's film productions to capture audience attention. This situation produced or enhanced a competitive environment among film producers as to who can make the most realistic portrayals showing crimes against the law (murder, robbery, etc.), sex, profanity, vulgarity, profanity and obscenity (the precursor to pornography). Comparisons – one of the biggest hits among gangster films produced during this period that some experts and historians call as the Golden Age of Hollywood was The Public Enemy that starred James Cagney and made him a certified box office draw. This film followed another remarkable gangster film which was the Little Caesar starring Edward G. Robinson, the two films were produced by the Warner Brothers film studio. These films were made a bit before the Production Code took its effect on movie productions of gangster films, which included hits like Smart Money, A Slight Case of Murder and I am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang that still portrayed viciousness and violence according to the so-called Pre-Code realistic period. Along this line, James Cagney, as an example of what a gangster was all about, succeeded in portraying the Irish-American as an urban, ethnic criminal but albeit a tragic hero. Most films at around this time were based on the life of Italian gangster Al Capone. Besides Cagney and Robinson, Warner studios had other gangster film stars on its contract, such as Paul Muni and Humphrey Bogart, the one actor most identified with these films. The dynamics of the film industry dictated big studios to focus on a particular film genre, and Warner Brothers studios, as one of the Big Five, came to be known as the gangster studio. The gangster films were the most suited as direct beneficiary in the introduction of sound to films, because it was socially realistic with a generic approach to its narrative to become a commodity (Strinati, 2000:57). The decade of the 1930s also came to be known as the heyday of gangster films. The Production Code came to be strictly enforced by the censors around 1934 and gangster films begun to lose their appeal. Anything considered indecent could not be shown, or any of its relevant or significant portions cut; the result was that this film genre tried to be idealized portrayals of life, far from reality. The Warner Brothers studio opted to make films depicting a moral or philosophical line such as melodramas, historical epics or swashbucklers. Example of this paradigm shift was The Roaring Twenties (1939), with a toned-down gangster ethic. Conclusion Part of the allure of gangster films was their relation to famous real-life gangsters such as the great Al Capone who was also a friend of Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel who operated beyond the law and still managed to establish a legitimate business in the Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas. The decade of the 1930s coincided with the growth of Las Vegas where gambling was finally legalized, allowing mobsters and gangsters to engage in legitimate businesses and move away from a life of crime that produced huge amounts of money from prostitution, extortion and of protection rackets. Other infamous underworld figures such as Meyer Lansky, Lucky Luciano and Lepke Buchalter had either gone underground or legit in their businesses and so were no longer in the public's consciousness or news. The New Deal programs of President Franklin D. Roosevelt revived the economy from the worst effects of the Great Depression and people again had good jobs to occupy their time. The economic resurgence was exemplified by the rise of Las Vegas aided by public works of the government that had provided relief to jobless millions, like the giant Hoover Dam located nearby in Boulder City, Nevada. The state soon legalized gambling in 1931 and mobsters poured their monies into building the plush hotels, expensive casinos and lavish resorts. These factors diverted attention from gangster films and together with the use of colour in films later, other genres became engaging, without requisite gangster stories. Films again became wholesome entertainment, especially the introduction of cartoons. A combination of factors caused the decline in the popularity of gangster films: the reviving economy and changing moral values at the time (even mobsters shied away from the public eye or limelight and integrated themselves into the legal system) and the slow demise of the star-contract system in Hollywood (McDonald, 2000:104) ; the film industry no longer depended solely on gangster films which relied on star power, as other genres became viable again as safer alternatives. People had also stopped blaming the system (Munby, 1999:140). Reference List McDonald, P. (2000) The Star System: Hollywood's Production of Popular Identities. London: Wallflower Press. Munby, J. (1999) Public Enemies, Public Heroes: Screening the Gangster from Little Caesar to Touch of Evil. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Nowell, R. (2011) “The Ambitions of Most Independent Filmmakers: Indie Production, the Majors, and Friday the 13th - 1980.” Abstract. Journal of Film and Video 63(2), pp. 28-44. Shannon, C. (2005) “Public Enemies, Local Heroes: The Irish-American Gangster Film in Classic Hollywood Cinema,” New Hibernia Review, 9(4), Winter, pp. 48-64. Strinati, D. (2000) An Introduction to Studying Popular Culture. London: Routledge. Vany, A. D. (2004) Hollywood Economics: How Extreme Uncertainty Shapes the Film Industry. London: Routledge. Read More