Tuesday, May 19, 2015
White Heat & the Gangster Genre
In at least 3 hearty paragraphs, discuss White Heat, as well as the characteristics of the gangster genre and its role as an art form. In your discussion, bring in another gangster film if you've seen one on your own (The Godfather, Goodfellas, etc.). Your discussion should be in relation to the Warshow article I handed out in class and the idea of the gangster as an individual. I want to see 2 quotes from the article in your discussion. Use your film textbook for more information on the gangster genre.
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When watching White Heat, The characteristics surrounding this film has a dark and edgy theme evolving around a gangster named Cody. Cody is portrayed as a ruthless person driven insane after his mother unexpectedly died while he was in prison and was in hopes of escaping prison after he was caught robbing a train soon afterwards. White Heat is considered a gangster film by many people. The gangster genre is usually portraying the main character a disaster waiting to inflict damage on human society. The gangster genre is also expressed as the loss for hope on human society or at least for a country when that place is in turmoil or in the midst of a economic crisis,which explains why most gangster films often evolve around main characters either stealing money, or causing trouble for the police and other people that may be significant to the narrative. However even though they cause problems for some characters, these gangsters do this for a good cause. This is noticeable in White Heat, where Cody escapes prison to kill “Big Ed” for harassing cody’s girlfriend Verna. Also White Heat gives the impression that the main character are living in luxurious and lavish lifestyles, but in reality his whole world is crumbling around him, and is losing touch of himself, with his co-workers, and reality,which explains why Cody lives in a nice house and treated with love and care by his mother, but lives away from the city and society in a rural setting to which is mainly treated with disrespect by his girlfriend and prison guards.
ReplyDeleteLike I said before, the gangster genre usually portrays the main character as a “Tragic Hero” and is seen as the living bane of society, mostly because of the trouble they can inflict on other people. The gangster genre is also supposed to emotionally attach the viewer to that one or more specific group of characters. One example of this is where Cody is having lunch in the prison’s cafeteria, he was alerted by his friends about his mother unexpectedly dying. He then goes berserk and was forced to be taken away and held in a psychiatric ward. This scene is supposed to make the viewer have pity on Cody because he was told about the death of his mother without him seeing her one last time, and because he was overly obsessed with her. Also as I said before, White Heat explains Cody’s loss of reality becomes more prominent as the narrative progresses. According to Robert Warshaw “ At a time when the normal condition of a citizen is a state of anxiety, euphoria spreads over our culture like the broad smile of an idiot.”
Another Gangster film I’ve seen is “Goodfellas”. The movie Goodfellas also follows White Heat’s cinematic language, and the gangster genre as a whole. One example that it follows the gangster genre, when it shows a scene where Jimmy and his friends are shown at a dinner party having a conversation about the people he had killed, he then jokes about those people and when he and his friends laugh and having a good time, one of the people from his group said that he was a funny guy. Jimmy then takes this as an “offense” and give the feeling that he’s going to cause trouble. This then quickly resides as he said he was joking the whole time. This a perfect example of where it gives an illusion about having a “happy” society over an already damaged and torn world between the characters are currently facing. Robert Warshaw explains this by saying “ The gangster film is remarkable in that it fills the need for disguise (though not sufficiently to avoid arousing uneasiness) without requiring any serious distortion. From its beginnings, it has been a consistent and astonishingly complete presentation of the modern sense of tragedy”.
“White Heat” focuses on its main character, Cody, a ruthless and mostly cold-hearted gangster. He seems to care little about the men who work for him, even having some of his men killed off because he has no more “use” for them. However, he does care deeply for his mother, who took care of him until her death while he was in prison. Because of his love for his mother, and maybe even a grudging bit of respect for his men, Cody can be seen as a tragic hero, never destined to win in the game called “life”. “White Heat” truly portrays what the gangster film genre is all about, being dark and gritty, with no “happy” endings for the main characters, except for the police, who are the “good” guys. Like Michael Corleone from the “Godfather” trilogy, Cody was never going to truly win at life, even though they both reached the top of their world (becoming the big boss (Godfather*cough*) they hold onto that position, though they both don’t really have any true support from anyone, thus making them more of tragic heroes. Even though they are at the top of the “food chain”, they used brutality and harshness to get and stay there. As said in the article, since the audience does “not normally see the rational and routine aspect of the gangster’s behavior, the practice of brutality - the quality of unmixed criminality - becomes the totality of his career.” Michael ends up retiring from being the Godfather of the Corleone family, growing tired of all the violence, while Cody is killed by the police.
ReplyDeleteBecause the gangster genre is all about showing the true “dark” and unhappy side of any country, it is very dark and violent, as well as going against the norm of every movie being “happy” and not focusing on the reality of where one lives. This caused a lot of unrest with moviegoers who disliked the idea of a movie being so… Realistic in the fact that any country is not perfect, and that they have their flaws. As Robert Warshow said in his article The Gangster as Tragic Hero, “the defenders of the “positive” side of America are being deceived if they think that it is relevant to point out that most Americans have never seen a gangster.” Meaning that this type of life is being lived way too close for comfort, closer than they thought. The gangster genre also shows the audience that even though the main characters are criminals, they are also human as well, and are capable of human emotion. This causes the audience to relate with them on a very deep level, they are truly the underdogs of the film genre. The want to taste freedom and wealth weighs heavily on the characters as they trudge through their messy lives.
The Gangster genre as a whole has affected every film today and in the future. It is one of the most enjoyed genres and its characters have become cultural icons for a reason. Gangster films pretty much led to the creation of an anti-hero, an arch-type almost more beloved than that of a true unflawed hero. Characters like Henry Hill, Michael Corleone and Cody Jarrett have grasped the attention of audiences for years because of their human-like responsibilities. We as a population can more easily identify with a tough guy who is down on his luck and has his own problems than a perfect almost unbelievable character like superman. “The gangster is a man of the city” –Robert Warshow, this quote expresses how the gangster is relatable. White Heat is an important film because it was a trail-blazer in the gangster genre.
ReplyDeleteWhite Heat, although not the first gangster film was important to the genre because it rejuvenated the genre with new areas for exploration. It took part in creating the archetype of an anti hero. The low key lighting of a film noir combined with the action of a thriller is the way White Heat put together the formula for an emerging genre. The low-key lighting gives multiple scenes a dark dingy feel and puts the viewer on edge with discomfort. The fast paced dialogue creates a stereotype of the smart, slick gangster. The dramatic change in diegetic sound surprises the attention of the viewer and shocks their perception of the film. The mise-en scene is dirty and lets the audience know the characters are murky and disheveled.
The symbols and conventions used in White Heat were regenerated into the many mafia films that have come out since. The Godfather was revolutionary in film and was because it took the conventions of White Heat and added more character quality. Martin Scorsese’ classics Goodfellas and Casino use the anti-hero archetype. In Goodfellas Henry Hill is just a neighborhood kid that the audience identifies with and cares for throughout the film even though he kills people. The characters around him especially Joe Pesci’s character are pure evil similar to the characters in White Heat. Another one of Scorsese’s films, The Departed based on the Japanese film Internal Affairs, uses a plot similar to White Heat. The Departed involves an undercover cop similar to the undercover cop in White Heat.
When I think of different themes for a gangster film, making the audience feel sympathy for the main character or the head gangster would never come to mind. The idea of a gangster is somewhat of a heartless person; someone who is ruthless and dominant in their quest to fortune and will kill to get what they want. Most movies follow suit to this, which is why this assumption is made. White Heat isn’t like this in comparison to other Gangster films like Goodfellas.
ReplyDeleteWhite Heat, produced in 1949, was considered by critics and still is considered by critics to be one of the top gangster movies behind The Godfather and Goodfellas. This film stands out however compared to a movie like Goodfellas because almost all of the guys in Goodfellas, I had little to no sympathy for them whereas in White Heat I had a much stronger connection to Cody as of his strong love for his mom who comforts him and drives him to be better. Only his mother is the one who helps him through his migraines and although he does many bad acts throughout the film, it’s sad knowing that she passed away while he’s in jail, and he experiences his downfall. Another difference between Cody and the main character from Goodfellas is that the main character from Goodfellas is the narrator of the film, whereas Cody is only the main character, not the narrator. I feel this forces the audience to be a little farther away from Cody, while still having a grasp on connecting with him. During the entire film, this distance just makes the audience feel like they aren’t even apart of his life in comparison to Goodfellas, so it greatens the audiences sympathy for him because he seems more isolated and alone without his mother and without an audience connection.
“At bottom, the gangster is doomed because he is under the obligation to succeed, not because the means he employs are unlawful.” This quote from the Warshow article explains how Cody was doomed from the start of the movie, and he would eventually have to come to an end. This was the scene where Cody gets chased to the top of the giant gas cans eventually killing himself by shooting it and blowing himself up. I feel this was the best way to end the film as he decided when to end his own life making his own decisions like he did throughout the whole film. This film is by far my favorite of the Gangster genre and speaks wonders when you feel emotional connection to the main character.
White heat spurred on a completely new genre called "gangster", what we now associate with big guns, fedora hats, and shiny watches (probably stolen) tucked in the pockets of fancy and oversized pin-stripped suits. Director Raoul Walsh created a film form characterized with a mobs and organized crime, overlapping with the era of film noir. This genre is thought to be reflective of the Great Depression and the economic and social instability of the 1930's. As hard work proved fruitless, the disarray the country fell into was reflected in the dishonesty and scamming of mobsters. Yet in this way, we are forced to identify with these sinister gangsters because they were molded by society, rather than going against it and it’s norms.
ReplyDeleteWhite Heat revolved around the flamboyant, epileptic, and mother-dominated Arthur Cody Jarrett, the ring leader of his gang. Since we spend so much time viewing the characters life and behaviors, we identify with him and place him in the role of protagonist, as is common in the gangster genre. This connection “fills the need for disguise without requiring any serious distortion” to recognize the main character to be in the pursuit of happiness. He finds solace in his mother, the only person he can put his whole trust in. This flaw and quality of Cody’s makes him come off as a tragic hero. Seeing as most films in this genre are based on real life situations, events, and people (ex. Little Caesar, with Caesar Enrico Bandello representing Al Capone), White Heat can be paralleled to the story of the New York murderer Francis Crowley. The film also incorporated the femme fatale character who twisted the emotions of the protagonist: Verna Jarrett. One can identify the traditional film noir techniques within the film as well with the shady black and white work of the director of cinematography. The director takes advantage of the mise-en-scene to emphasize the extravagant characterizations of the mobsters.
Received with open arms by viewers, White Heat has stood the test of time and is now revered to be one of the best and classic gangster movies of all time. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ve ever seen another gangster film to compare it to and testify the truth of the claim. However, I am able to recognize the art put into the personality of a gangster within film and American life, dangerous with the familiarity of his sad city’s language and knowledge, which Robert Warshow claims to be the true center of the genre, “thus the importance of the gangster film, and the nature and intensity of its emotional and aesthetic impact, cannot be measured in terms of the place of the gangster himself or the importance of the crime in American life”.
In Robert Warshow’s essay entitled, “The Gangster as a Tragic Hero,” he says the following: “…the imaginary city, produces the gangster: he is what we want to be, and what we fear we may become.” I think this fits very well with the way White Heat makes the viewer identify with someone we might otherwise view as sinister. Robert Warshow argues that the gangster is not a criminal, because the city the gangster exists in, is figurative-they reside within a realm beyond human comprehension-if you will. In the movie White Heat, we see a man in a less than desirable role in society, taking on the characteristics of being the protagonist of the story. Because we are let into important details, the detail of Cody loving his mother completely and irrevocably for instance, the gangster in this instance becomes easy to identify with. Where passively, before, I thought that gangster films were to praise some sort of evil and almighty deity with no job but to yield corruption in a city, this course has highlighted my own ignorance on the subject, because I’ve learned that the sole purpose of the gangster film is to make the protagonist, a gangster, easy to relate to. The audience looks past the act, because they have come to know what is golden about someone viewed so negatively by society. This, however, has only covered the, “what we want to be,” aspect of the quote. What a general public would fear to become is arguably someone in the painful position of Cody, whose mother is just as twisted as he may be. A victim of childhood neglect, as implied from the instance it is described that as a child Cody has splitting headaches, but as he grows older, the headaches became a reality, and having lost his father at a young age, it’s no surprise that he has become ruthless; however, the audience starts to question that at what caliber of a horrific event would one turn inherently evil.
ReplyDeleteAnother thing Warshow discusses about the gangster film is the relationship between irrational and rational actions by a gangster in a gangster film. Where the brutality necessary to achieving a rational goal, is irrational, it is justifiable in that the overall goal is rational-justifiable in the movie’s sense, I mean. “Man is a being with the possibilities of success or failure.” Therefore end therefore justifies the mean. Again, there’s a constancy to the audience being able to overlook, or in a sense, familiarize themselves with the violent tactics associated with gangsters achieving their aspirations.
Although I have not had the opportunity to watch any other gangster films myself, due to a lack of interest from preconceived (false) notions, my uncle is a huge fan. After discussing at length with him, Goodfellas, I noticed some automatic parallels between it, and White Heat. My uncle says, “you can’t help but feel sorry for ‘em,” referring to, who I have learned to be a man by the name of Henry. In this instance, I realized that there was a level of sympathy for the ruthless, in that they are very much relatable. Furthermore the main characters of Goodfellas and White Heat were similar because the development of them allowed them to be viewed as less harsh than their counterparts. I think this goes along with the common notion that if you surround something bad with something worse, the bad thing being surrounded becomes good to the bystanders.
“America, as a social and political organization, is committed to a cheerful view of life. It could not be otherwise.” The quote from an essay written by Robert Warshaw perfectly embodies gangster identity in the early 1900’s gangster films. The main character of White Heat, Cody Jarrett, evoked both sympathy and hatred from the audience.
ReplyDeleteWhite Heat, completed in 1949 and directed by Raoul Walsh, is considered by critics to be one of the greatest gangster movies, on par with movies such as The Godfather, one of my personal favorites. In White Heat, the audience feels a much stronger connection with Cody because of his strong emotional attachment towards his mother, something many audience members can relate to. His mother drives him to be great and supports him with comfort constantly. In addition, she cares for him at times of need such as when Cody’s migraines make a reappearance. All of this makes Cody, in some way or another, relatable. The fact that Cody is our main character also forces the audience to cope with Cody the whole time, establishing a sort of connection. This connection is progressed the most when Cody is in prison in my opinion because it heightens how lonely Cody is without his mother.
“At bottom, the gangster is doomed because he is under the obligation to succeed, not because the means he employs are unlawful. In the deeper layers of the modern consciousness, all means are unlawful, every attempt to succeed is an act of aggression, leaving one alone and guilty and defenseless among enemies: one is punished for success.” This quote, again from Warshaw, explains how Cody had no hope to survive from the very beginning. The scene where Cody dies at the top of the gas tower exemplifies the strength and ruggedness of Cody. The fact that Cody ended his own life showed how only Cody Garrett is in control of his life.
-Adil Kadwa
One reason gangster films were and still are so popular is because people are fascinated with a character who goes against the ideals and norms of society, essentially going against "Americanism" as Robert Warshow's essay on " The Gangster as Tragic Hero" states. As an audience we easily sympathize and relate to the rule breaking, struggling yet ingenious individual as we all can acknowledge that side of ourselves. One film that especially evokes a sense of pity and hope for the underdog within the audience is White Heat. Cody Jarrett may be considered to be on the antagonist side, but after following his unhappy life you may find yourself rooting for the "wrong" side.
ReplyDeleteThere are reasons why we empathize with Cody even though his role is supposed to be evil and unethical. This first unmistakable factor is the close relationship he has with his mom. The average viewer has close ties with family and understands this personal and special connection Cody and his mom have. As an audience we may not understand his street life and other tribulations but as human beings we understand his love for his mother which for us might be a good enough reflection and explanation of who he really is, in other words that Cody is not that much different from us. Another factor that enables us to sympathize with the street thug is the infidelity and lack of loyalty from his wife. It is obvious from the way she is portrayed that she is unhappy and only stays with Cody out of fear. As a population we have all witnessed or experienced trouble with loyalty especially in relationships. Cody may choose his unlawful lifestyle, but he sure didn’t choose or had any control over a wife who is cheating and unfaithful. It's the issues and situations that humanity deals with as a whole, no matter who you are, that makes Cody's hardships understandable. Even though gangster films are expected to be full of crime and tense encounters, gangster films are in reality about the struggles to survive and the realities of life that everyone goes through.
Another interesting point introduced by Warshows essay that was also interesting is that “we are not permitted to ask whether at some point he could have chosen to be something else than what he is.” This basically means that we as viewers never question how this person got to this place in life or how he became a gangster. Ultimately we start from the same place but all change and develop based on our surroundings and environment all throughout life. I think that if the audience was allowed to see and question a characters origin, that any character from anywhere for that matter, would be understood and empathized with on some level. Overall I think the concept of the gangster is “what we want to be and what we afraid we may become.”
I most of the gangster films I’ve seen, I’ve empathized pretty much entirely with the gangster. The gangster is the ultimate anti-hero; we always secretly want them to win, to beat the cops – after all, who doesn’t love a rebel? In White Heat, however, I absolutely despised the character of Cody Jarrett. Most gangsters in gangster films have at least some redeeming qualities; a strong moral code, or something of the like. Cody Jarrett, on the other hand, is a psychopath. He has no nice qualities at all, and well he may be a fascinating character to watch and a perfect vehicle for James Cagney, he is dissimilar to modern day Gangsters in that he seems to be devoid of any good traits. We empathize with gangsters like Vincent Vega, Mr. White, Michael Corleone, because we see people who have the guts to act outside the law, well also maintaining some sense of ethics and code – people that we could be, theoretically. The gangster represents, as Warshow says, the person we want to become, but know that, even if we think we can, we can’t. Well to some people he represents the ultimate tragic hero, Cody Jarrett strikes me much more Noah Cross than D'Angelo Barksdale, and for that, I would say this may be the only Gangster movie in which we, the audience, empathize with the cops.
ReplyDeleteWhite Heat did blaze the way for many more Gangster movies, however. Because of his slightly oedipal attachment to his mother, much of the audience (except me, I guess) can relate to the character we see in Cody, who appears at his heart, even if he is so psychopathic, to be a pretty lonely dude. In this way, we see Cody – the gangster – as a anti-hero of sorts, someone who we can identify with and also despise at the same time. Warshow notes that the Gangsters must always be punished for their actions, because even though we relate and sometimes even admire them for doing the things that we cannot, we also know they cannot be allowed to succeed. This represents the sort of duality at the heart of the gangster genre – that we all want to be these characters, that we can relate to them and yet be glad when they are punished. We see this so much throughout Gangster flicks, and it’s why we watch them – so we can pretend, just for a second, that our lives are as cool as theirs, or as fast and fun and glamorous as theirs. We watch them, ultimately, as a form of escape. That’s why the gangster has to not only be relatable, but also be punished – we cannot pretend we are them if they aren’t relatable, and we need the punishment to remind ourselves that this is not the right thing.
One last thing; not a huge fan of this movie. I get it’s ridiculously influential, but I really could not relate to Jarrett whatsoever.
I have never seen another gangster film to compare this to, but I decided to watch The Sopranos on my own for this assignment. White Heat, 1949, is one of the top classic crime-heist dramas of the post-war period. The Sopranos is a television series about gangsters that refers, in more than one way, to American cinematic gangster traditions. The series contains some of the cinematic qualities of previous gangster masterpieces. Many of the scenes in which Tony’s mob congregates in the back room of the Bada Bing, a topless “joint”, are lit to resemble Renaissance paintings, as in Francis Ford Coppola’s Godfather trilogy, with the men picked out by light from unseen sources against a black, impenetrable background. The extreme detail with which White Heat records how the mother of protagonist Cody Jarrett is tracked by the FBI is alluded to in the first episode of the second season, “Mr. Ruggiero’s Neighborhood”. This may seem like a hilarious parody to “aficinados” but we are made aware to the details of the FBI’s moment by moment deployment of technology in an effort to gather incriminating information about Tony and his crew, adjacent to an undercover sting. White Heat is also referenced in the connection with one of the most innovative narrative aspects of the series: Tony’s relationship with a female psychiatrist. Much as Cody Jarrett has debilitating migraines, Tony has debilitating panic attacks, and in each case the mental illness is related to the gangster’s mother. The self inflicted, go out “by their self death” is in both White Heat and the Sopranos and Warshaw’s quote of “At bottom, the gangster is doomed because he is under the obligation to succeed, not because the means he employs are unlawful.” Explains why this is because the gangster is doomed in this genre from the start. (Personally not a genre I understand to well nor really care for).
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