Respond to the two questions in the comments section below:
What is the “New Hollywood”? Briefly discuss two economic and social factors that led to its emergence.
In “Images of Blacks in the work of Coppola, De Palma and Scorsese”, Maurizio Viano argues Scorsese represents the racism of the Italian-American community in order to achieve an “expressionist realism”, which we can define as a strategy whereby the director, by portraying the racist beliefs and prejudices of his characters may examine and “exorcise” his own. Outside of the examples provided by Viano, in what ways does a discourse on racism and prejudice emerge in Scorsese’s Mean Streets? How does Scorsese connect these issues to the conflicts within the main protagonist, Charlie (i.e. his attempt to transition from youth to adulthood)?
The “New Hollywood” refers to a film style that came about in the 1960’s and 70’s that used more realistic storylines and borrowed cinematic techniques from the French New Wave to appeal to a wider (younger) audience.
One contributing factor that led to this formation was the liberal social climate following the Civil Rights Movement of the late 50 and 60’s. Average people were drawn into politics and headline news stories and wanted to see films that dealt with the realities of American life. They were also interested in hearing points of view different from what the traditional media presented to them.
Another factor was the popularity of television. With color television and an ever-growing variety of shows, consumers could be entertained at home. The “New Hollywood” movement created films shot on location with improved sound and visual effects to bring customers back into the theaters.
2.
An example of prejudice that occurs in “Mean Streets” occurs when Charlie walks into Tony’s bar and sees a Jewish girl (or supposedly Jewish). Charlie asked who she is and Tony replies that she is Jewish and is in the bar with a different guy every night. “You know how they are,” Tony says.
This is an example not only of prejudice the characters show toward someone of a different ethnic background, but also toward women. In this scene Charlie attempts to claim her as his own to exert his ego simply to show up the girl’s boyfriend. To him, her race and gender make her an object that can be used to make him look like a bigger man.
Two things brought this change on too Hollywood and one of them was TV. Being so convenient and ever changing TV made it pointless to go out and spend money on a movie when you could just watch a show at home. Hollywood saw this as a threat and started to make changes with their movies such as better more "real" stories. Another issue that cause the "New Hollywood" was the Paramount case. Before this case studios owned there own theaters and decided what movies played in them, thus controlling their own future after the case this was banned and now theaters were free to play movies produced by any studio, or a movie produced by an independent producer thus making the studios compete against each other and changed the way films were made.
2. In the film Mean Streets When Micheal was showing off his girlfriend to some guy Tony comes over and tells him he saw her kissing a black person. This disgusted Micheal and after making a comment and wiping his lips he seems to forget about the girl after he spent time bragging about her to a buddy. By showing his disgust about kissing a black man he portrays himself as a racist and no better then any of the people he deals with like Johnny boy.
Scorsese uses racism quite obviously in Mean Streets, and attacks a variety of racial and social groups. He makes an indirect attack on the gay community with the scene where they are fleeing the bar and the gay guys are riding in the car. While it seems that Charlie's crew are OK with the guys (they did let them in the car), the fact that Scorsese had bystanders yelling and making prejudicial comments showed a sort of passive-aggressive feeling. There were also a few openly racial scenes, most notably the scene where Teresa is talking down the African American cleaning lady. It is interesting that Charlie apologizes to the lady, showing a sort of maturity in his character.
2. Scorcese uses himself and the prejudices encoded as a 3rd generation Italian-American as a model for Charlie in Mean Streets. In his films, he assaults everyone with the topic of racism and according to Viano, "no one leaves unscathed." Charlie, under the guise of Scorcese, admits openly about his "duty" (as Viano asserts) "to fear a confrontation with blacks in accordance with a preconstituted script (193.) Scorcese also implicates the audience with his discussion of race by the way he places the Italian-Americans (white) and African-Americans (black) on the screen with each other. Scorcese is subjective about his placement of racism and racist attitudes in his characters. He does not ever deny these placements nor the decision to use them. The racism seems like second nature to Charlie, although he does consciously acknowledge it. Charlie, like Scorcese, realizes it is part of his "duty" as an Italiann-American.
#2 In his essay, Maurizo Viano limits the discussion of the roles Blacks play in the Scorcese film - MEAN STREETS to the will they/won't they interplay between protagonist and Scorcese alter-ego Charlie and the exotic dancer/taboo object of desire Diane. I would call attention to Scorcese's use of sarcastic humor in calling attention to Italian American bias against African Americans. I refer tot he scene in which Charlie's retaraunt owner friend - Tony - decides to "break the balls" of another patron (Michael) by telling him that he has seen the girl Michael plans to marry openly kissing a black man in public. Apparently, in the world of MEAN STREETS, this type of malicious, wholly unfounded rumor is more than enough to destroy any future relationship possibilities. We see confirmation of this, and a glimpse into how deep seated these predjudices are when Michael almost sub conciously wipes his own lips in disgust. We see another example of how racist beliefs are ingrained into the Italian-American psyche when a previously sympathetic character bursts into a spontaneous and virulent display of racial epithets directed at a worker in a Chinese restaraunt.
#2 The character Charlie in Mean Streets has many racist, prejudice thoughts and actions throughout the movie. Many of these thoughts and actions have a choice that Charlie must take go with what he feels is right and what would look good in the eyes of the family. One so thought and action is his actions towards the African American dancer that works as a Go-Go dacncer at teh night club. Charlie shows an almost exotic interest in Daine. Asking her out to dinner and she choses the chinese restaurant. Both the chinese rest. and Diane are very foreign to Charlie and his upbringing but its almost as if he wants to explore and interact with her and her culture. But his past and family relationships will not allow for such a thing to happen. this is shown when he drives past Diane waiting for him in the cab and "what am i crazy?" then tells the driver just to take him back where he picked him up from. in this scene Scorsese is having Charlie challenge the idea of why cant he hang out with a African American girl. For Charlie it seems that he looks past many of the prejudices that come up within the story but gets caught into the prejudices that already exist as he tries to climb the ladder within the organized family.
(2) The character of Charlie in Martin Scorsese’s Mean Streets deals with several situations dealing with either his or his friend’s racism and prejudices. There are many examples throughout the movie and do not play on any one particular race or gender. One of Charlie’s friends is boasting about kissing a young woman when a fellow friend says that he saw her kissing an African American man. This friend of Charlie’s finds this disgusting and soon drops the subject, seemingly hoping that no one brings it up again. Then after the shooting in the bar, Charlie and company find themselves with a pair of gay men; when trying to escape in a car one of the gay men shouts out to people on the street. The reactions by those people on the street include many demining comments about gays; and eventually Charlie and his friends throw the gay pair out of the car. Then there is the scene where Teresa and Charlie are leaving a hotel room and while waiting for the elevator, Teresa speaks rather rudely to the African American cleaning woman. Charlie in response apologizes for her remarks as he sees that the woman is just trying to do her job.
The filmmaking style changed from stories to reality, action, violence, sex, and language. The cineamic techniques also changed to keep the audience interests in the films, instead of old fashioned way of assuming what happens next before seeing what happens next. The timeline changed, the shots changed, almost everything changed in filmmaking. People saw this new and huge changes in filmmaking and wants to see what is the new. They dont want to see old, they want to see the new. Hollywood has news to show, no more oldies.
2) In Mean Streets, there are obvious plenty of racism going on. The dancer at Tony's bar is a black woman. Charlie has a thing going on with her in his fanasty. He stopped himself just because she is black. The viewers hears his voice while the camera set to see him staring, supposedly at the dancer, saying "She is good looking. But she is black." This is obviously a racism against black woman. This relates to the scene at the hotel where Teresa insulted the black housekeeper about using her hands to clean up the room. Those two scenes are the most obvious racism against the black. Scorsese cant seem to stop himself from being a racist through Charlie. There are other characters that appaers racists too. For example, jewish girl at the bar and Tony explained how she is there every night with different men. Racism going on everywhere in the world and even in the films.
Prejudice in Mean Streets, in part, helps drive the plot along, and sometimes it works just as comment on the community. An example of a comment on racism is when Michael is told that the woman he is currently seeing was kissing a black man under a bridge in New Jersey. In turn we see Michael respond offended and disgusted. This reverts back to the Maurizio Viano article in which it stated that Scrosese was trying to express the sexual fear of black men that exists in almost all white men even they don’t themselves believe it’s true. Racism isn’t the only prejudice show cased in Mean Streets. An example of a prejudice that drives the plot is Teresa’s condition. Teresa suffers from epilepsy, but despite that fact wants to move out on her own. Charlie’s uncle refuses to accept the idea that her epilepsy is chronic neurological disorder, but believes she’s “crazy”, due to this Charlie keeps their relationship secret. Charlie respects his uncle and needs him to get the restaurant uptown; this interaction between the three drives the plot.
Charlie is trying to be a decent person; he’s trying to outgrow the prejudice in his community. Him outgrowing, rising above, and questioning these idea’s is part of his transition from childhood to adulthood. His goal throughout the whole movie is to move beyond the childhood phase and situation he currently finds himself in.
2. An example of how Charlie display's racism in the movie "Mean Streets" is when he's in the exotic night club with his friends early in the movie and he has his eye on an attractive women but, she's African-American, or as Charlie said, "a black girl." We no this is a problem because Carlie is thinking to himself that she's such a pretty women but it could never be anyway, simply because of her race.
2) Racism and Prejudice emerge several times throughout the movie MEAN STREETS. The main example is seen in the character of Diane, a dance at the bar. When she is first introduced to the audience, the main character Charlie thinks the she is pretty but follows that thought with "but she's Black". This shows some of the inner conflict going on with in the main character over race relations. The acknowledgement of her beauty shows Charlie's attraction to her and something that may not have even been considered a generation earlier. However, the following thought of "but she's Black" delineates the meaning of the previous comment, implying both that Black is something that doesn't equal pretty as well as the futility in his attraction. This seems typical of the ambivalence seen among third generation Italian-American as described in the lecture as "Get and education, but don't change". Charlie seems aware of racism, but unwilling to change his use of it.
Mean Streets is filled with racist remarks and prejudice, but the part that stood out most to me is the scene with the homosexual man in the backseat of the car. When Charlie first found out that he was gay he didn't seem to care that much, but when the gay man started making a scene, and making it known that he was gay to the outsiders walking on the street, Charlie and his friend got embarrassed and didn't want to be seen transporting a gay man. The didn't want people thinking that they're gay also. This negative prejudice of gays is humerous at the time, but when you analyze the way Charlie and his friend react by kicking him out of the car, the viewer can see how immature Charlie really is. I think that is what Scorsese was going for in this scene.
1) The "New Hollywood" was born in the late 1960's, and the 1970's,setting Classical Hollywood on its ear, and starting a revolutionary renewal in
American film that boasted such directing stars as Steven Spielburg (Jaws), George Lucas ( American Grafitti, Star Wars), Martin Scorsese (Mean Streets
Good Fellas), Francis Coppola (The Godfather,Apocalypse Now), and more. A major economic change involved the film being financed independently of the big daddy
companies like Warner Brothers. Sometimes, this meant much smaller budgets, but better quality. As a matter of fact, such "quality" began to phase out the"quantity" of such old time epics as ""Ben-Hur," and family films/musicals like
"The Sound of Music." Socially, the "New Hollywood," dared to use no-names in its pictures: actors like Gene Hackman, Harvey Keitel, Robert De Niro, and actresses like Faye Dunaway, Barbara Streisand, Katharine Ross, Anne Bancroft,
etc. This made the films more true to life as these 'ordinary' people lived,walked, and breathed normally rather than being trapped in the stuffy old scripts that "Old Hollywood" had such a difficult time letting go, in which
people acted out static roles from film to film.
2)Martin Scorsese's discussion on racism and prejudice in his first major film "Mean Streets," flickers then flames throughout the movie. This is most obvious in his main character Charlie Civello. The first prejudice, women, ties
into Charlie's fear of the opposite sex as attempts to become a man. Any viewer can notice the young man's terror, for in two very explicit scenes is it made
manifest. The first is in his friend, Tony's, bar. Getting up on stage with the black stripper, Diane, he starts to dance sexily with her. Here, he is comfortable; his friends are there to remind him that women 'service' men, and
pose no threat. With Charlie's love for Teresa, it is majorily different. There are no pals to back him up now. He sees her as a vampire, so much that when he
climaxes sexually with her, he 'ejaculates blood.' She is therefore stealing his manhood. He is fearful of falling in love with her, and losing his control
over her. Therefore, he has to foully cuss at her, and treat her as a child to maintain his own fragile hold on his perceived reality.
Black people scare Charlie. No where is this more obvious than in his treatment of Diane, the beautiful black stripper. Though he is attracted to her, he has to remind himself that 'she is black.' Immediately a curtain falls.
However, the young man is fascinated by his own racism, and tries to date this forbidden fruit. She accepts, but in the end, Charlie does what a normal,
youth of his age would do. He chickens out, under the unseen, but quite palpable pressure of friends, and community, who encourage his racist attitude.
He leaves Diane out on a dirty street to fend for herself, and return home.