Old Stories: America's Fight Against Corruption
Three Old Films Depict our Efforts to Stop Mankind's Oldest Profession
You are reading False Choices, a substack dedicated to the belief that there are many more choices available to us than the advertised ones. Every Friday I publish a post that reviews films or literature that provide different, less popular choices. Thrilled to have you along and thanks for reading!
It’s a compliment to the United States that we, the citizens, have always been scornful of corruption. We know what it is and we hold it in the greatest contempt. But why? Do other societies exhibit the same earnest desire to fight and defeat what is arguably mankind’s oldest profession? Or does the US have that much more corruption to overcome?
Let us understand that many anthropologists now believe that the leadership of the earliest human societies, those that grew beyond a clan of hunter gatherer kinsmen, was really a protection racket1; some more noble than others, but still at their base they offered protection to productive workers in exchange for their taxes, rents, military service when required and, most importantly, their labor. A stationary community who grew crops and raised domesticated animals required protection and at the top of the hierarchy were the families who provided that protection and managed the corps of protectors; they guarded the guardians. Obviously this was a corrupt bargain as the masses did all the work, took most of the blows and generally paid the highest price for the contract.
In Europe this arrangement evolved to the Medieval social contract of lords and their serfs. Very begrudgingly the average man eventually gained some rights. When America was settled by these same Europeans there was an extraordinarily strong desire to unchain oneself from these types of social arrangements. The desire for freedom was spontaneous and heartfelt, and the early settlers were only too ready to take up arms against their former lords. Corruption was an especially egregious transgression; it was an attempt to reintroduce the chains that had previously been broken, to force free people to accept serfdom again. When gangs extorted cash from local businesses for ‘protection’ or when a union forced its members to stay silent about the extortion of dues, these were not just run of the mill crimes; the thievery was less egregious than the bondage. It was the bondage that made people livid.
Like a boil on an otherwise beautiful backside, we also had slavery. Then, an abolition of slavery movement, and a civil war. This past spring Mary and I visited several Civil War battle sites. Their preservation helps the visitor understand the great sacrifices made to end the bondage of the slaves. Again, Americans will bend in many directions, but bondage makes us break, and fight.
In post WWII America, the motion picture industry became a dominant cultural force. There was a tidal wave of creativity after the war and Hollywood was out in front. It helped that people had money to invest in movies and that the public had money to attend the cinemas. One of the themes of movies during this period was corruption, many different types of corruption. The films below all take a different angle on the corruption theme, but in the end they all make the same uniquely American point: making bad choices for the quick buck eventually leads nowhere - a place without choices, without freedom. You’ve forced others into servitude, but in the end you lose your freedom; unless, like Brando’s ‘contenda’, Terry Malloy, you confess your sin and redeem yourself.
The Naked Street has a really good performance from Anthony Quinn. You feel his frustration and anger as his choices dissipate to none. Quinn makes the audience like him just enough to follow him down, but when he lands we are out of sympathy. Good film.
Black Tuesday likewise has an outstanding lead performance by Edward G Robinson. It’s a shame, I noted to myself while watching, that we don’t have actors who look like Robinson in the movies anymore. All the leading men are now out of fashion mags I guess. At any rate, this film depicts, more than any other I’ve seen, how arrogance and evil lead us into a vortex of ever more narrow and worse choices. Good action movie, with great pace and well thought out scenes. Plot is wild but still convincing.
Interesting that a young Peter Graves plays a supporting role in both of these films. I remember him from television in The FBI.
On the Waterfront, what else can be written? A tight, tense drama that includes a scenes that you can’t forget. Maybe a little melodramatic, but you can’t argue with its ageless popularity. Always one of the top American films as chosen by the ‘experts’, and in this case I have to agree. Definitely worth watching again.
That all three of these films came out at the same time is no accident. Hollywood studios commonly spied on each other to make sure they were ‘in the game’ so to speak when the latest films from competitors hit the cinemas. And our collective hatred of corruption comes to the surface at times when the headlines demand the public’s attention.
The first two below are free on Youtube, On the Waterfront must still attract enough of an audience because it is for ‘rent’, also on Youtube.
The Naked Street (1955) Anthony Quinn, Peter Graves, Farley Granger, Anne Bancroft
Black Tuesday (1954) Edward G. Robinson, Jean Parker & Peter Graves
On the Waterfront (1954) Marlon Brando, Lee J. Cobb, Karl Malden, Eva Marie Saint, Rod Steiger
Is Government a Protection Racket? https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/is-government-a-protection-racket-how-wheat-and-taxes-built-the-ancient-states/