Elia Kazan's seminal American classic. Marlon Brando is the dockworker with dreams of being a being a prizefighter who fights the murderous corruption of the New York docks
Kazan at the height of his powers, as yet untraumatized by any involvement with Senator Joe, and free to elucidate the grim imprisonments of life around the Brooklyn docks.
Brando is Terry, the boy who coulda beena contenda, stuck between casual slavery unloading packing cases in the harbour and the dream of being a prizefighter; Eva Marie Saint is Terry's girlfriend, trying to negotiate a way out of their lives; Rod Steiger his sly brother, Karl Malden the priest forced to watch his flock demoralized and dehumanized by the murderous practice of the shipping companies and the union.
The finest scene is not the one in which Brando and Steiger have their taxi-cab altercation about one-way tickets to Palookaville, but a confrontation between the lovers, a breathless, savage, desperate argument that's almost drowned out by the blare of whistles and klaxons from the harbour. Two faces - and what faces! - locked in emotional battle.
Brando is Terry, the boy who coulda beena contenda, stuck between casual slavery unloading packing cases in the harbour and the dream of being a prizefighter; Eva Marie Saint is Terry's girlfriend, trying to negotiate a way out of their lives; Rod Steiger his sly brother, Karl Malden the priest forced to watch his flock demoralized and dehumanized by the murderous practice of the shipping companies and the union.
The finest scene is not the one in which Brando and Steiger have their taxi-cab altercation about one-way tickets to Palookaville, but a confrontation between the lovers, a breathless, savage, desperate argument that's almost drowned out by the blare of whistles and klaxons from the harbour. Two faces - and what faces! - locked in emotional battle.
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