On the Waterfront

The movie "On the Waterfront" was, in my opinion, a good movie.  The kinds of movies with mobs, crime, and some suspense are the kinds of movies that I like.  This movie was not only a crime suspense movie, it was also a romance between Terry and Eddie.  Terry was a longshoreman who was just trying to do what he could to survive.  Sometimes that included doing things for the mob which he was not proud of; in the first scene we see Terry calling up to Joey Doyle to tell him that he found Joey's lost pigeon.  Joey agrees to meet Terry up on the roof so that they can put the pigeon away but when he gets up there Terry is no where to be found, instead the Johnny Friendly, head of the mob, and his people are there waiting for him.  They eventually push Joey off the roof and make Terry an accomplice because he drew Joey up to the roof.  Eddie is Joey's sister, throughout the movie her main goal is to find out who is responsible for her brother's death and hold them accountable.  Terry and Eddie accidentally meet and start talking, Eddie wants Terry to help her find the person who is responsible but Terry obviously cannot do that since he was a part of it.  Terry and Eddie spend some time together and they have a few moments where they do end up kissing but when Eddie finds out that Terry helped murder her brother she is quite upset.

 Throughout this movie there are a lot of times when the characters are turned against themselves and what they think is the right thing to do.  It starts out with Terry and his decision to help the mob get Joey, he thought that they were just going to rough him up a little bit and when they do push Joey off the roof Terry is distraught with feelings of guilt, anger, and worry about what will happen to him.  After that terry has to deal with Eddie trying to figure out who killed her brother and whether or not he should tell her, he wants to because then she will know and he doesn't want secrets between them, but he doesn't for a couple of reasons. The first being that if the Friendly and his gang find out that Terry talked they will come after him and probably kill him, the second being that he desperately wants Eddie to like him and if he is responsible for her brother's murder she will want nothing to do with him and probably tell the Waterfront Crime Commission.

They characters all played good roles, they were all convincing with both their actions and what they said.  Terry did a very good job acting distressed and sincere when the times arose and Eddie played a good act as a concerned sister.  Father Barry plays the "good guy" influential role to Terry when he advises him to tell the truth about Joey's death.  Also, again  towards the end when Terry is going to revenge his brother's death Father Barry advises him not to because that would be showing everyone that it is okay to do what the mob does.  At the end after Terry was mercilessly beaten and close to dead he shows his true nature and leadership skills by getting up walking the docks and going to get his days work slip.  This shows everyone around him that good people can survive without doing wrongful deeds.  It shows the people that they can stand up against organized crime, do what they want to do, and make an honest days pay.  This movie kept my attention and although it was in black and white I would enjoy watching it again because of the strong plot throughout and the roles played during.

Zach Schuchard

Casablanca was not one of my favorite movies, but there were some things that I did like throughout it.  What I liked about it was how it allowed sound, sight, and motion to work together to do what pictures and paintings could not.  Another thing I liked about it was how I thought it portrayed the message directly without having to use symbols and printed words.  One thing that I found interesting was how the movie did not follow the ordinary Hollywood movie cut out and mixed up the ending.  Normally, with Hollywood movies the characters are all happy and everything is resolved; but not in Casablanca, at the end either Rick or Victor Laszlo would have to let Ilsa go and get over their love for her.  I thought that this made the movie a little more interesting to watch because it left me wondering what was going to happen next.  One thing I did not expect to happen was Rick letting Ilsa go with Laszlo, even though he was over her I did not think that his pride would ever let her go.  Although I didn't like it, the movie is remembered as one of the best from that time and seemed to be a success.

As far as acting goes I though it was pretty good, the actors were believable and I think that, especially for that time, they were the best that were around.  Everyone seemed to be in the moment during every scene and they seemed like people that others could relate to with how they react to certain situations.  Each of the main three actors had something that they had to bring to the movie to make it successful and I believe that they accomplished that.  Without them the movie may not have been what it is today.  On top of the actors doing a good job, the lighting during the movie was pretty good, it was good enough to see everything that happened.  I liked how they used the spotlights throughout the movie so that we could see who was doing everything.  The fact that it was in black and white made it hard to see the different things going on during the movie but the lighting partially made up for that downfall.  

The movie was made in an interesting time, it was filmed during World War II which made the topic or war and Nazis a little more touchy to make a movie about.  There are some things that are shown in the movie that remind people about what is really going on around them.  The spotlight that was being shone from the tall tower shining on the city shows the people that they are always being watched and the things that they do are being noticed; especially during a time of war when things are more sensitive.  I think that it was a good showing of how things were in different places and I think that the way the movie portrayed the Nazis was interesting.  It showed them to be demanding, controlling, and unforgiving and I liked that they took that angle on it.  

Zach Schuchard