On the Waterfront (Special Edition)

Media:	DVD
Directed by:	Elia Kazan
Starring:	Marlon Brando, Karl Malden
Release date:	23 October, 2001
List price:	~~$24.95~~
Our price:	$17.77 that is 29% off!

On the Waterfront (Special Edition)

Average rating: Stars

A Perfect Screen Play, Location, and an Acting Tour de Force

It is hard to find any faults with this movie that was filmed on location in New Jersey, and many critics consider it to be an almost perfect film. The story is loosely modelled after the rampant corruption of the long time mob controlled docks in New York and New Jersey. The characters are either part of the dock workers or their families or as is the Karl Malden character a priest from the outside supporting the workers in their fight against the union. The movie is short, just 108 minutes, and the plot takes a few liberties with the facts, but that is hardly noticed as we watch the movie, and that does not change our viewing enjoyment. It is after all just a Hollywood movie not a investigative documentary of the docks.

The casting director is the one that deserves a lot of the credit - and an Oscar - but the writing, the directing, and acting are all outstanding - an overworked word but that is the decription appropriate here. Supporting acting is usualy a weak spot in many movies - but not in this movie. Here we have an almost perfect cast selection combined with many good elements of movie making. It is hard to top Marlon Brando as a young tough guy, a young retired fighter, and a young but polished, slim blonde beautiful, and intelligent Eva Marie Saint as the opposite lead and then all this backed up by Karl Malden, Rod Steiger, and Lee J. Cobb - all having many good lines, or improvising with great intensity and creativity.

Elia Kazan was an outstanding director, and this is clearly demonstrated here. In many ways he has a difficult job since the plot is a bit thin and the story compressed into 108 minutes; there is not much violence here as opposed to the real mob controlled docks where many were killed, and the Cobb character would have been a lot tougher in real life; most of the movie dialogue is made up of slow moving conversations between Brando and Saint so that part is a bit tricky for a director; the feel good ending is also a bit far fetched but it gives a quick wrap up to this movie. Those faults or challenges are all covered over by the great acting including Brando who manages to demonstrate both brute toughness and simultaneously a deep tenderness towards Eva Marie Saint.

A key part of the story is Brando's internal struggle to decide which side to support - his friends in the union including his brother played by Steiger or the Crime Commission and his girl friend Saint and the priest Malden. The young actor Brando is fairly convincing in portraying that fight with his internal demons. They battle right versus wrong, corruption versus decency, good versus evil, and through this the viewer develops a connection with the main characters - we sympathize with the good guys in the movie,i.e.: Eva Marie Saint, Brando, and Malden. The Catholic priest Malden does just enough to keep Brando in line on the moral high ground without getting them both killed. As in his many other acting parts, Malden seems perfect for the part. Lee J. Cobb seems ideal for a slightly flawed union boss - he comes from a tough background but now is perhaps not tough enough or smart enough to survive a crusading priest. Movie history is made with a very intense scene between Steiger and Brando in the back of a cab, where the brother - Steiger - tries to convince Brando to stay with the corrupt union.

This is a well crafted black and white film with the right combination of romance, drama, fear, bravery, and loyalty. It has a Hollywood ending and everything else that we might hope for in a movie, but it is slightly short for the story it attempts to tell - especially in retrospect with the lengthy Godfather as a reference.

It does not have the beautiful scenes of say Lawrence of Arabia or strong music, but it must be among the top 10 to 20 best movies of all time - largely due to five great actors working with strong directing. I rented the DVD but was so impressed that I bought a copy. The DVD has the normal trailers plus extra film shots, filmography, and an interview with the director Kazan, and one with Rod steiger who walks us through the famous back seat of a cab scene, a scene partially filmed while the slightly insecure Brando was missing from the filming, visiting a psychoanalyst.

5 Stars - no question.

On the Waterfront (Special Edition) - Marlon Brando, Karl Malden

Brilliant film, great camera work -- lousy history!

I highly recommend this film, but give it only 3 stars for history's sake. The portrayals of Marlon Brando as Terry Malloy and Rod Steiger as his corrupt brother who has a change of heart (not to leave out Eva Marie Saint as the girlfriend, and Lee J. Cobb as the rotten union boss) have become icons of great American cinema. The cinematography can't be beat. I love watching it.

But what this film could've been if it only told the truth!

Director Elia Kazan and writer Budd Shulberg created this effort as an apologia for their collaboration with the House UnAmerican Activities Committee (HUAC) during the Red Scare of the 1940s and 50s. Read the Communist Party as the Mob, the misguided longshoremen unwilling to testify agaist the mob as the Left who refused to cooperate, and the valiant Terry Malloy as Kazan and Shulberg and you get the picture. The truth is far more interesting, for in order to glorify themselves Kazan and Shulberg had to ignore the role of the Left in fighting the Mob on the New York docks.

The film opens just after Terry's pal, Doyle, is murdered by the mob for his willingness to testify before a Gov't commission. The lonely cries of the longshoremen for justice is a direct allusion to the murder of the real-life Pete Panto, the fiery organizer buried alive in a lime pit by the mob. Back in 1939 it was "Who Killed Pete Panto?" that was yelled out in the middle of the night and scrawled on the walls. The irony is that Pete Panto was a Lefty working for Harry Bridges, the West Coast longshore leader and perennial target of the Red Hunters. Harry recruited a number of organizers to help the New York longies fight the mob, and many ended up alongside Panto. We now know how and why. The FBI was bugging Harry's phones. When they learned of another organizer they in turn would notify the leaders of the mob-dominated ILA, the east coast union, who in turn would make the guy disappear. Fighting Communism they called it.

The role of Karl Malden, as the fighting labor priest, is also interesting. This role is modeled after Father John Corridan of the Xavier Institute of Labor Relations (Fordham University). Although bitterly opposed to one another, the labor priests of the Xavier Institute and the Communist Party were the only two outlets for the embattled longshoremen. Even Corridan had to admit, "The only constant information dispensed on the waterfront
comes from either the Communist Party or from this school." It was indeed dangerous, as portrayed in the movie, for longshoremen to show up at meetings held by the labor priests (there was more than one priest), but the fact of the matter is that up until 1948, it was the Communist Party that carried the fight on the waterfront. For instance, it was Sam Madell of the CP who organized "Backpay Committees" in Brooklyn, Hoboken, and Baltimore. Several thousand longshoremen joined these committees to fight for the overtime and backpay siphoned off by the ILA leadership. Many of the New York Longshoremen were Italian, and Catholic by birth, but they remembered with some bitterness the Italian church as part and parcel of the status quo. In turn, they also remembered the Italian Communist Party as the one institution that consistently fought for unions and the interests of laborers.

The final battle (fistfight) between Terry Malloy (Brando) and Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb as the union boss) is, of course, complete Hollywood malarky -- particularly the closing scene as the triumphant Malloy leads the men back to work (which is exactly what Friendly wanted), with the Honest Ship Owner in the background waiting to receive them. Clearly, no such fistfight would've ended mob domination (Malloy would've been thrown off a roof within the week), nor were the ship owners neutral, honest, or benign. They were as crooked as Johnny Friendly. The real Longshoremen fought long battles with the mob and their corrupt union, with one wildcat strike after another, for years. Going out on strike and staying out was the only way, not walking back into the lion's mouth after a fistfight.

The great irony in all this: Kazan and Shulberg defend their own behavior by comparing Communists to Mobsters in a movie about beleagured longshoremen fighting for justice on the waterfront, when in reality the Communists -- the very group that Kazan and Shulberg (and HUAC) were trying to destroy -- were risking their lives to fight the mob, and were the most influential group in the fight.

All and all, I still love this film. I'm a softy for Brando and Steiger's brilliant work as two brothers, one who trusted, one who betrayed. "On the Waterfront" is an affront to history, but a great movie.

At the time, many of the longshoremen may well have felt the same. Excited at first with the thought of their story being told, and with the notion of Brando playing one of them, they left the theaters terribly disapointed. One veteran of the times, in a History Channel interview, told of encountering Marlon Brando soon afterward in a airport waiting room. He introduced himself as a New York longshoremen, then asked, "How could you guys have betrayed us so?" Reportedly, the unknowing actor could only return a blank stare.

Marlon Brando, Karl Malden - On the Waterfront (Special Edition)

I Actually Liked It!

I saw this movie as a recommendation from a substitute teacher of mine. I didn't think I'd like it because I saw two Brando movies before and hated them. I also saw clips and thought the movie seemed a little dumb.

This is Brando's movie. I really liked him in it. He seemed natural and appealing and yet distant from an audience point of view. One thing that I've noticed about movies that I like is that the actors don't seem to be acting. This is how I can tell if an actor is good or not. I hate finding myself critiquing performances during the movie, watching to see how an actor moves his hand to emphasise a scene or how he speaks certain lines. To me, watching a movie shouldn't be about that.

On The Waterfront had a mediocre story, but it was still good. I think Brando's acting helped it out a lot. It seemed to be set up to be a tragedy; I was expecting an unhappy ending. I was pleased that there was a happy one in it, or at least a semi-happy one.

The one thing I did not like about it was the crazy 50s West Side Story type music and camera work. It cheapened the drama of the film, I think. The music played in moments sometimes where it wasn't that necessary or where it made certain events anti-climactic. The part where Charlie is killed seemed overly dramaticized. It was no suprise that it was going to happen and the music made it seem like a mystery.

As a final random thought, I would like to say that I really liked the pigeons in the movie.

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