-Caveat Lector-
Gangs of New York
by Al Gore
(Typing by P.J. Gladnick)
Hooker?
Gangs Of New York had the potential of being a great movie but failed in large part
due to
Leonardo DiCrapio giving one of DiCrapiest performances ever seen on the big screen.
With
all the millions they pay him, you would think that DiCrapio would make just a little
effort to
mimic something of a convincing New York Irish accent.
Instead, we hear DiCrapio veering over to a fake sounding Irish brogue only to quickly
lapse
back to a jaded Hollywood nightclubbing drawl. And what DiCrapio was doing on the
screen
wasn't even acting. It was more like marking time until DiCrapio could crawl back to
his
superstar trailer.
But should we be surprised? Have you ever seen DiCaprio's non-performance in The
Beach? That movie was so bad that if Michael Medved ever updates his Fifty Worst Movies
Of All Time, it would surely supplant The Trial Of Billy Jack on that list.
Almost as ridiculous as Leonardo DiCrapio's sleepwalking through the role of Amsterdam
Vallon was Cameron Diaz trying to pass herself off as a common street whore, Jenny,
with
pickpocketing talents in the Five Corners slum section of New York in 1863. Who can
believe glamour girl Cameron as a slum whore for a nickel a throw? However, I don't
blame
just director Martin Scorsese for this particular bit of miscasting. Hollywood has
never
realistically portrayed hookers on the big screen.
Take a look at Hollywood Westerns. Even if the scene is a saloon in a small dust
covered
Old West town, all the hookers would look like either Ann-Margret, Ursula Undress, or
Anita
Ekberg (as they appeard 40 years ago). Not only were the Hollywood Old West saloon
whores always great looking but they could also sing and dance. To believe these
movies,
you could picture some broken down cowpoke telling his buddy:
"Well, Clem. I sure do like that Ursula Undress but she just can't sing near as well
as Ann-
Margret so I think I'll take a roll in the hay with Annie tonight."
The sad truth is that the whores (or what they called "soiled doves") of the Old West
were
mostly GROTESQUE. Take a look at the photos of the hookers from that era…big fat, and
ugly beyond belief. However, the cowboys back then weren't very picky. After a couple
of
months on the cattle drive, even Elsie the cow would look like hot stuff. Come to
think of it,
what do you think those cowboys were doing with some of the prettier cows out on the
cattle
trail? They didn't call them "cowpokes" for nothing.
No wonder cowboys hated sheepherders. It had nothing to do with grazing rights. They
were
just jealous of all the great action the sheepherders were getting with their flocks.
Yeah, so if you were ever transported back in time to the Five Points area of New York
in
1863, you sure ain't gonna see many Cameron Diazes working the streets. If Scorsese
wanted accuracy, he would have cast Rosie O'Donnell in the hooker role…and pulled out
about a dozen of her teeth for authenticity.
Even dumber than casting Cameron Diaz as a whore was Amsterdam's angry reaction when
Jenny told him that she might be putting out for William "Bill the Butcher" Cutting as
played
by Daniel Day- Lewis. If I were Amsterdam, I would be a little more concerned about the
THOUSAND other guys that Jenny the Hooker spread her legs for. Instead of getting
morally
outraged about Jenny getting boinked by Bill the Butcher, Amsterdam should have been
sweating over the fact that his "beloved" probably had the Clap.
What do you think the odds were of a street hooker working the bums of Five Points back
then at about a nickel a throw NOT carrying some horrible social disease? How about
somewhere between Nil and None?
But, of course, Hollywood rarely presents the disease scourge carried by hookers.
Instead,
according to their distorted view, it was all fun and games with Ann-Margret or Ursula
Undress or Anita Ekberg or…..Cameron Diaz. To reflect the reality of prostitution back
then,
they should have had a scene of Amsterdam in a doctor's office with dialogue like this:
AMSTERDAM: Doc, my Talleywhacker has been painfully oozing red and green stuff ever
since I shtooped Jenny. I must have the Clap so could you give me a teaspoon of mercury
for a quickie cure?
DOCTOR: Well, Amsterdam. I have good news and I have bad news for you.
AMSTERDAM: What's the good news?
DOCTOR: You don't have the Clap.
AMSTERDAM: So what's the bad news?
DOCTOR: You've got the Syph. However, I've got some more good news and bad news for
you.
AMSTERDAM: Okay, this time give me the bad news first.
DOCTOR: Syph is incurable. You're going to die a long agonizing death and go insane in
the process.
AMSTERAM: Now tell me the good news.
DOCTOR: I just bought a brand new revolver. It can put you instantly out of your misery
without you feeling a thing.
Depressing, huh? And a far cry from the glamour girl portrayal of prostitution back
then by
Cameron Diaz. Of course, any chick that looked like Cameron Diaz (as she appears
wearing
makeup to cover her pizza face pimples) would be working some rich guy with the idea of
marrying him and shaking him down for more loot. A woman such as this is what is known
as a "courtesan" which is really a high class hooker. A modern example of a "courtesan"
(high class hooker) was Pamela Harriman who worked Randolph Churchill and Averell
Harriman as her marks.
In addition to the incorrect portrayal of prostitution in particular, Gangs Of New
York was rife
with historical inaccuracies in general. Martin Scorsese tried to play the class
warfare game
on the big screen. Nice try, Marty, but better to leave playing the class warfare game
to
professionals such as me. This is something that should be limited to the political
arena. If
you try it in the movies, it just leaves you open to charges of playing fast and loose
with
historical facts.
Let's take the "nativist" Bill Cutting.
According to the movie he was strongly pro-slavery and anti-Lincoln. In reality, most
"nativists" in the North back then were anti-slavery and pro- Lincoln. This was a
point of
antagonism between the "nativists" and the Irish immigrants since the latter were
mainly
against fighting the South as well as strongly anti-Lincoln.
Meanwhile, Amsterdam and his fellow Irishmen were portrayed as being tolerant toward
other minorities. They even had a black guy in their gang. Actually, most of the Irish
immigrants of that era hated black people because they feared economic competition from
free blacks who were willing to work for lower wages than the Irish.
Some of the murders of the blacks during the 1863 New York Draft riots were shown but
these scenes happened so quickly it was easy to miss that the Irish rioters were the
perpetrators of the killings. Instead, Scorsese focused on the working class Irish
rioting
against the wealthy class of New York.
Not only does Scorsese gloss over the fact that the immigrant Irish were usually
violently
anti- black but he avoids some very inconvenient political labels. For example, you
would
never know from this movie that Abraham Lincoln was a Republican and not some sort of
liberal Democrat. But how can that be? Haven't Bill Clinton and I labeled Republicans
as
closet racists? Oh well, at least we can derive solace from the realization that
Lincoln was
probably a progressive Republican who fought the big money interests.
OOPS! You say that Lincoln worked as a railroad lawyer? But how that that be? The
railroads, as our professors have taught us, were run by a bunch of greedy robber
barons.
You see what I mean about inconvenient facts? Somehow they just don't seem to fit into
Hollywood's version of history.
Okay, so maybe the Democrats did tend to support slavery and secession but that was
only
during the Civil War. As soon as that struggle ended they once again became the
enlightened party that we know them to be today.
OOPS! You say that the Democrats ran the dirtiest and most racist Presidential
campaign in
1868 that appealed to White supremacy? Damn those inconvenient facts but at least the
first Democrat elected in the 20th Century, Woodrow Wilson, had progressive views.
OOPS! You mean that Wilson wrote a book favorable to the Ku Klux Klan and re-instituted
segregation in Washington, D.C. that was relaxed under previous Republican
administrations? Well, perhaps Wilson hadn't yet achieved the enlightened views of
later
Democrats, one of whom was so revered that the Russell Senate Office Building was named
after that wise and noble senator, Richard Russell.
OOPS! You say Russell was the leader of the Senate bloc of segregationist Democrats who
filibustered against Civil Rights bills? Perhaps Russell hadn't reached the tolerant
level of my
dear Dada who was in all ways a perfect senator.
OOPS! Are you saying that my daddy as Senator voted AGAINST the Civil Rights Act of
1964? Perhaps he knew it was political suicide to follow his conscience. As for me, I
have
never stooped to the level of those nasty Trent Lott Republicans and their subtle
appeals to
racism such as we saw in that Willie Horton TV commercial used against Michael Dukakis
in
1988.
OOPS! I almost forgot. It was ME who first aired that Willie Horton commercial. Heh!
Heh!
Can we just conveniently forget about that incident?
Anyway, I think you can see my point. History is full of inconvenient facts and Martin
Scorsese treads on dangerous territory when he presents the typical Hollywood black &
white version of History.
However, that is all in the past. Today the moral differences between Republicans and
Democrats are clear. Republicans are evil right-wingers who only help the rich while
Democrats are enlightened progressive souls interested in aiding the poor.
For this incontestable fact I cite the authoritative The West Wing TV show. And unless
Aaron Sorkin starts putting some bad crack in his pipe, The West Wing political
formula will
continue to remain:
REPUBLICANS = EVIL
DEMOCRATS = GOOD
Despite a great performance by Daniel Day-Lewis as William ("Bill the Butcher")
Cutting,
Gangs of New York was ruined by Leonardo DiCrapio dozing on neutral as well as glaring
historical inaccuracies. Therefore on my Chad Rating Scale of one to ten with ten
being best,
I give Gangs Of New York only six chads.
This is the NEW Al Gore keepin' it real with a reminder to that stupid ho', Jenny,
that the
California Gold Rush was over for at least ten years when she wanted to accompany
Amsterdam out there in 1863 in order to fruitlessly pan for that precious metal.
http://freedom.orlingrabbe.com/lfetimes/gore_gangsny.htm
P.J. Gladnick may be reached at [EMAIL PROTECTED] Other articles by P.J. may be found in
the Writer Index.
-30-
from The Laissez Faire Electronic Times, Vol 2, No 2, January 13, 2002
Editor: Emile Zola Publisher: Digital Monetary Trust
A<:>E<:>R
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is distributed without charge or profit to those who have
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