Ahira's Hangar

A few years ago I was having pizza with some buddies, and the first season of the Sopranos was just showing, when I brought the subject up one of the people at the table launched into a rant about how the American mass media glorified the life of organized crime. Then last fall while visiting my parents in Southern California I was out to dinner with them and my aunt and uncle, and I mentioned the premier of Mr. Smith, a short lived series starring Ray Liotta as a hood. After my statement my uncle said something like, 'OH another TV show that glorifies criminals'. If you need to know the first fellow holds a JD but does not work as an attorney, and my uncle worked in Law Enforcement for about five to seven yrs.

So does any of us agree with the two assessments above, and do those assessments say anything about the American psyche and appetite for mass media? Consider, The Godfather series is one the most respected movie series ever made.

Yes and no really.

I think it's a staple of American mainstream media entertainment that in the end, the bad guys always get their come-uppance. Yes, on the one hand, things like that do appear to glorify crime. And think of the "gangsta" movies as well.

But to be honest, when we speculate about the outcome of movies/whatever, we often say "It's American, they'll never let the bad guy get away with it."

Probably a generalisation, but usually criminals and rug addicts come to a sticky end in US entertainment. Exceptions?

--A

Sorry I missed this interesting topic the first time around. Taras, I concur with the stance of your friends and your uncle. I regard the Sopranos with something approaching contempt: I agree that it glorifies the criminal lifestyle. The lead actor of that show is almost like a sex symbol, and for what? Playing a ruthless mafia bastard, right? I also have no patience for the Godfather films. Yes, I acknowledge their significance in the history of American cinema, but personally I don't care for what those films stand for. They've ended up romanticizing the mafia lifestyle so much that when the "real" godfather, John Gotti, was brought to trial, he was a celebrity and even a kind of hero to some. Am I wrong in this?

I have zero tolerance for gangsters. Plain and simple. Is it any wonder that I prefer a show like Law & Order? It may well be my favorite television drama of all time. I prefer a show in which the stars aren't the gangsters and the murderers, but the detectives and prosecutors who go after them. It's also no wonder that I prefer a movie like The Untouchables, in which an incorruptible Eliot Ness doggedly pursues and takes down Al Capone for the wretched thug he is.

Av, you make a salient point. Yes, I suppose the bad guys "always" get it in the end in mainstream movies (and not just American, to be sure). But as I see it, this "message" at the end is often rendered impotent by what has gone before - the emphasis on the glamorous life of the criminal before his comeuppance. That's the "Don Juan" message, seductively saying that if you're doomed to go to Hell, you might as well sin to the fullest - which means if you're a mobster, you might as well take down the city with you to Hell. While dressed in the finest tailoring, drinking the finest wine and having all the pretty girls at your command. Sex and violence. Seducing the viewer. So what if he gets it in the end? The audience would rather be the wealthy mobster with the unbridled libido than the noble but underpaid cop. In the end, what or who does the audience really care about?

At least in a movie like The Untouchables, the lines are drawn clear: our sympathy is with Ness, not Capone. Although, Av, knowing your intense dislike of authority, you'd probably not be impressed with Ness. I don't go around worshipping authority myself, but neither do I worship criminal or aggressively antisocial behaviour.

I certainly don't like agressively antisocial behaviour. And I'd be a lot easier with authority if they limited themselves to curbing that.

Sounds like a good movie Duchess. Actually, now that I think about it, in Natural Born Killers they get away with it as well.

--A

In the following discussion there will be spoilers for some well known films and most of them are well over ten yrs old. Sorry.

I'm gonna be disagreeable here, but sorry Avatar I don't agree that in U.S. films the 'bad' guys always get theirs in the end. FWIW, that might have been true in the days of the 'Hayes' Code, a movie production code that's supposed purpose was to keep the movie business on the moral straight and narrrow, BUT the Hayes Code has been out of force since around 1968 or so (forty years). Examples, Vito Corelone (Marlon Brando) dies while chasing his grandson around in backyard garden, Michael Corleone never meets any justice for his crimes (the murder of his daughter may be viewed as a form of moral judgement and punishment). Goodfellas, does Henry Hill pay for his crimes, not so much?

Considering a larger point, does this appetite for this type of entertainment point to any moral corruption of U.S. at large. NO, because I do not believe that TV watchers or movie goers are so infantilized to think they and go watch The Godfather series and then want to be Vito, Michael, Sonny, or Connie. And yes I'm aware of the discussion that took place a few years back when the anniversary DVD edition of Scarface was put out and there were reports of RL bad guys all saying they wanted to be Tony Montana.

MOre comments...

Well, I will concede that there are some exceptions, but they are outnumbered considerably by movies where the reverse is true.

--A