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Movie Review: On the Waterfront (1954) [1]
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Date: 2025-03-22
SPOILER ALERT!
The theme of On the Waterfront (1954) is the morality of testifying against others. When the movie starts, Terry Malloy (Marlon Brandon), a longshoreman, is given an order by union boss Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb) to trick Joey Doyle, a friend of Terry, into going up on the roof to get one of his pigeons back. Joey is hesitant because he plans on testifying against the union before the Waterfront Crime Commission, and he knows that his life is in danger. Nevertheless, he goes up on the roof where two mobsters are waiting for him. They push him off the roof.
Terry is devastated. He says he thought they were just going to lean on him a little. Problem is, Joey was standing right near the edge of the roof when they leaned on him. Anyway, Terry now knows that Friendly ordered that murder. He also becomes aware that several other hoodlums knew what would happen, including his brother Charley (Rod Steiger). Of course, Terry cannot say anything to anyone about the murder because that would be stooling.
Later, Charley tells Terry to attend a meeting at a church where Father Barry (Karl Malden) is trying to help longshoremen who are being exploited by Friendly. That way Terry can report back on who was there. Terry says, “Why me, Charley? I feel funny going down there. I’d just be stooling for you.”
But that’s different, Charley explains. “Let me tell you what stooling is. Stooling is when you rat on your friends, the guys you're with.”
Of course, these so-called friends have just been using Terry. He is especially irked when Charley has conveniently forgotten that he was the one that told Terry to throw a fight because Friendly and other mobsters had placed big bets against him. And so, whereas Terry might have gone on to become a champion, his boxing career was over.
In the end, Terry decides he has been ratting on himself all these years, and he testifies before the commission.
Elia Kazan is said to have made this movie as a way of justifying his testifying before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1952, admitting that he had been a member of the Communist Party and naming fellow members of the Party. Those on the right have long associated unions with communism, so when Terry finally testifies against the union before the Waterfront Crime Commission, it corresponds nicely to Kazan’s own testimony before HUAC.
I read that while the particular story was written by Budd Schulberg, much of it was inspired by a series of articles about union corruption, “Crime on the Waterfront,” by Malcolm Johnson. So, I thought I would look into that background. In so doing, I came across an article by Sean Murphy, “‘An Underworld Syndicate’: Malcolm Johnson’s ‘On the Waterfront’ articles.” According to Murphy, Johnson’s articles led to the formation of the United States Senate Special Committee to Investigate Crime in Interstate Commerce, whose hearings were dramatized in The Godfather Part II (1974).
This naturally suggested a comparison between On the Waterfront and The Godfather Part II, not only in regard to testifying before a committee, but also in regard to the relationship between brothers.
In The Godfather Part II, Frankie Pentangeli agrees to cooperate with the FBI to avoid prosecution. He is assured that Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) will probably refuse to testify, pleading the fifth, in which case Frankie will not have to publicly testify either. Unfortunately for him, Michael does testify in his own behalf, proclaiming his innocence, denying that he is involved in organized crime. Much to his chagrin, Frankie knows he will have to testify as a result.
Michael thought that Pentangeli had been killed by the Rosato brothers. From what is said during the hearing, Michael figures out that Pentangeli is actually alive and will be testifying against him. On the day Frankie sits before the committee, he sees Michael enter the room with Frankie’s brother, who is a Mafia boss in Sicily. This makes Frankie feel ashamed. The idea of violating the law of omertà in front of his brother is too much for him. He recants what he told the FBI previously, saying he just went along with whatever they said, and none of it was true.
In On the Waterfront, Johnny Friendly sends Terry’s brother Charley to talk Terry out of testifying. Failing that, Charley is to set Terry up to be killed by one of Friendly’s hitmen, essentially asking a man to participate in the murder of his own brother.
Instead, Friendly should have just told Charley to try to persuade Terry not to talk. When Charley reported back, saying he was unable to do so, Friendly could say, “Thanks for trying, Charley. You did the best you could.” After Charley leaves the room, Friendly could then give orders for a hit on Terry.
If his goons are unable to find Terry, Friendly could tell Charley, “Plan on sitting in the committee room Friday morning so that Terry will have to look you in the eye while he testifies.”
The guilt Terry would feel would be even stronger than that felt by Frankie. Frankie would know that even if he testified, his brother would simply go back to Sicily, whereas Terry would know that in testifying, he would be sending Charley to prison right along with Friendly and several other hoodlums.
Finally, the last thing Friendly should have done is to kill Charley and display his corpse on a hook in an alley for Terry to see. At that point, Terry knows that by testifying, he won’t be sending his own brother to prison, thereby removing that motive for being silent. Furthermore, the murder instills in Terry a desire for revenge strong enough for him to disregard his own safety. He is completely freed up to testify, physically and morally.
Well, Johnny Friendly is no Michael Corleone, so I guess it’s believable that he would be as stupid as the movie makes him out to be.
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