THE UNTOUCHABLES - AL CAPONE

BRING ON THE LOVE

Its hard to believe that my recent observations on Jessica Alba and Slim Whitman would warrant any response..... But here is someone that may fail to evoke any kind of human sympathy... although as in my last two posts I have been proven to be... wrong (?) In either case here is a shot of DeNiro doing Capone.....

The whole thing about Capone to me is fascinating. But what is more fascinating that the man himself is this one dimensional movie portrayal that was made in the 80's. DePalma has managed to take an amazing true life story and trivialize it to card board character cut out portrayals. There were so many intriguing characters in Capones life but you'll see none of that happen in this film.

The main stars of, "The Untouchables" is the soundtrack and the camera movements. Capones speaking parts boils down to just three key scenes. We never see people like Johnny Torrio or Bottles or how his own brother was murdered by the police. Here was a perfect chance to create something memorable and that op was blown.

Kevin Costner plays Elliott Ness who has nothing more to say in this film but... "so, are you married?"

Married? Yeah. So What. What if I'm not?

David Mamet really must have been running out of things to throw into this script. The other thing that got a lot of laughter out of the audience when this was shown was the ridiculous Canada get up. Mounties riding shotgun over the Canadian plains really created a ruckuss when this was originally shown to audiences.

Too bad that stuff never really happened.

The scene in the Union Train station too was a goof. That was a scene taken straight from the movie Potemkin. It had nothing to do with reality or what passes for it. And Netti was never thrown off a building he committed suicide.

What you got at the end of the day is a feel good tour de farce. Its fun to watch but none of it has anything to do with Al Capone. The real Capone was a little more fascinating. This guy had underground tunnels and hideouts in Mexico and travelled by steamboat and learned how to kill at an early age. He shows up in a Chicago train station, (now condos) in the south side with 35 cents in his pocket, a pistol and a pregant teenage wife, May Capone. From there the story gets weird with his mental illness condition, (some now think he was possessed - after visiting Amityville, Long Island... seriously, look it up).

He hung out with Babe Ruth and even became Time Magazines man of the year. Getting good pictures of Capone is sort of difficult. The history books always run the same ones over and over again. Getting the real story of what really happened takes a little time. There are many stories that sort of conflict. The more amazing things that tend to pop up are his getaway trap doors he had installed in his club, THE GREEN MILL in Chicago and in the hotel walls where he stayed that led to hidden staircases etc.

The mentality of the country was interesting too. A lot of common every day blue collar types loved Capone and his generosity. Not everyone viewed him as a monster. Another key thing that was missing from DePalmas movie was how prevalent prostitution was in Chicago. Now the city takes credit for creating a 100 million dollar a year empire. A claim that i feel is bogus. The other thing was there were a lot of white slavery rackets going on. This town was a lot more brutal than what this film portrays. In comparrison its very wimpy.

In the 80's it was declared that Capone only brought in 3 million a year during his brief but bloody reign. In these politically correct times that number has jumped up along with everything else.... For histories sake we should keep things authentic. And honest.

The hotel scene in the film along with DeNiros scene at the Opera was shot in the Chicago Cultural Center. This sort of thing really ruins it for me. This movie is worth watching it for the camera work alone..... Its hard to find the real meat in here.

There you go, a little more insight and history for ya... but go ahead and knock it, the next thing I will see on this blog is how Capone was really more like Mother Theresa.

Cantu 2007