Gangster Film Reader

by Silver, Alain

• ISBN13: 9780879103323
• ISBN10: 0879103329
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-02-01
• Publisher: Limelight Editions

Summary

The first burgeoning of the gangster film in the United States began in the early 1930s, reflecting a very real and sensational gangsterism at large in American society. The classic gangster film trilogy Little Caesar (1931), The Public Enemy (1931), and Scarface (1932), all released within barely more than a year, borrowed liberally from contemporary books and newspaper accounts, with "Little Caesar" and "Scarface" modeled on the notorious mobster Al Capone. These three films quintessentially defined the gangster-film genre: the characters, the situations, the icons-from fast cars and tommy guns to fancy fedoras and fancier molls-remain established elements in mobster movies to this day.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. vii
Introduction	p. 1
Seminal Work
The Gangster as Tragic Hero (1948)	p. 11
Scarface (from Howard Hawks, 1968)	p. 19
The Gangster Film (1970)	p. 29
Iconography of the Gangster Film (from Underworld USA, 1972)	p. 39
Little Caesar and Its Role in the Gangster Film Genre (1972)	p. 47
Yakuza-eiga: A Primer (1974)	p. 65
Big Funerals: The Hollywood Gangster, 1927-1933 (1977)	p. 85
Post-Code Gangster Movies (from Gangsters on the Screen, 1978)	p. 97
All in the Family: The Godfather Saga (from Crime Movies, 1980)	p. 107
Case Studies
A Gangster Unlike the Others: Gordon Wiles' The Gangster	p. 119
White Heat: I Am Cody Jarrett, Destroyer of Worlds	p. 135
The Gangster According to Aldrich	p. 155
A Study in Ambiguity: The Godfather and the American Gangster Movie Tradition	p. 165
De Palma's Postmodern Scarface and the Simulacrum of Class	p. 183
Yoked Together by Violence: Prizzi's Honor as a Generic Hybrid	p. 195
Way of Life: GoodFellas and Casino	p. 209
Takeshi Kitano: Melancholy Poet of the Yakuza Film	p. 225
Contemporary Views
The British Gangster Film	p. 237
Reforming Hollywood Gangsters: Crime and Morality from Populism to Patriotism	p. 259
A New Kind of Girl for a New Kind of World	p. 277
The Gangster and Film Noir: Themes and Style	p. 291
Hits, Whacks, and Smokes: The Celluloid Gangster as Horror Icon	p. 325
Fukasaku and Scorsese: Yakuzas and Gangsters	p. 343
The Hong Kong Gangster Movie	p. 357
Family Values and Feudal Codes: The Social Politics of America's Fin-de-Siecle Gangster	p. 381
Notes on Contributors	p. 407
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.