West Side Story
Jun. 17th, 2016 02:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerI saw West Side Story a few weeks ago; I've been putting this movie off for a while because, well, Romeo and Juliet retelling, we know how that ends, and I'm not often in the mood to watch a double suicide.
But when I had the chance to see it with friends I jumped on it, and I'm glad I did, because it's a brilliant movie. Natalie Wood, who plays Maria (the Juliet character) is a delight as always, moving easily through emotional range required of her: everything from giddy, girlish happiness to infuriated devastation.
(But it says a lot about the early 1960s that even in a movie about race relations - a movie with an entire song devoted to race relations! - the Puerto Rican main character is played by a white girl.)
The guy playing Tony is far less memorable - honestly I thought he was blandly handsome and nice - but he's serviceable enough as a love interest. And the secondary characters are so strong that it doesn't matter anyway: I particularly liked Maria's best friend Anita (the nurse character) and the tomboy girl who wants more than anything to be a part of the Jets gang.
It also turns out that I didn't know how it ended after all; Tony dies, but although it certainly seemed for a little bit that Maria might shoot herself with the gun that shot him, she doesn't, and I think in some ways that's more powerful: the two gangs have gathered around and she castigates them, flailing the gun that shot her lover and generally acting like a mad prophet, speaking truth to their madness.
Will they listen? Will they stop fighting? They're certainly very sober as they walk away, but the movie makes no promises, and it has clearly outlined the systemic forces that make it hard for them to do anything else. It's not just a matter of two feuding families here.
I also found Anita's part in all this fascinating: despite the fact that Tony just killed Anita's own lover (who is Maria's brother), she's willing to try to get a message to him. The Jets of course aren't having any of this, and (the movie doesn't directly spell this out) they seem to be on the verge of gang-raping her when Doc (the Friar Lawrence character) interrupts.
And she's humiliated and furious, of course, and she tells them to tell Tony that Maria is dead.
I don't blame her for this: she's very shaken up and she just wants to hurt them any way she can, and that's the most hurtful thing she can think to say. But at the same time, for the rest of her life she's going to have to live with the fact that her actions got Tony killed - and Maria's going to have to live with that, and will she ever be able to forgive Anita for that?
I certainly doubt the Jets are going to forgive it. I wouldn't be surprised if Anita's parents end up sending her back to Puerto Rico to protect her. (And, if that happens, will Maria forgive herself for sending Anita with such a dangerous message?)
Underneath the singing and dancing and bright happy colors, this is an incredibly bleak movie. I admire that.
But when I had the chance to see it with friends I jumped on it, and I'm glad I did, because it's a brilliant movie. Natalie Wood, who plays Maria (the Juliet character) is a delight as always, moving easily through emotional range required of her: everything from giddy, girlish happiness to infuriated devastation.
(But it says a lot about the early 1960s that even in a movie about race relations - a movie with an entire song devoted to race relations! - the Puerto Rican main character is played by a white girl.)
The guy playing Tony is far less memorable - honestly I thought he was blandly handsome and nice - but he's serviceable enough as a love interest. And the secondary characters are so strong that it doesn't matter anyway: I particularly liked Maria's best friend Anita (the nurse character) and the tomboy girl who wants more than anything to be a part of the Jets gang.
It also turns out that I didn't know how it ended after all; Tony dies, but although it certainly seemed for a little bit that Maria might shoot herself with the gun that shot him, she doesn't, and I think in some ways that's more powerful: the two gangs have gathered around and she castigates them, flailing the gun that shot her lover and generally acting like a mad prophet, speaking truth to their madness.
Will they listen? Will they stop fighting? They're certainly very sober as they walk away, but the movie makes no promises, and it has clearly outlined the systemic forces that make it hard for them to do anything else. It's not just a matter of two feuding families here.
I also found Anita's part in all this fascinating: despite the fact that Tony just killed Anita's own lover (who is Maria's brother), she's willing to try to get a message to him. The Jets of course aren't having any of this, and (the movie doesn't directly spell this out) they seem to be on the verge of gang-raping her when Doc (the Friar Lawrence character) interrupts.
And she's humiliated and furious, of course, and she tells them to tell Tony that Maria is dead.
I don't blame her for this: she's very shaken up and she just wants to hurt them any way she can, and that's the most hurtful thing she can think to say. But at the same time, for the rest of her life she's going to have to live with the fact that her actions got Tony killed - and Maria's going to have to live with that, and will she ever be able to forgive Anita for that?
I certainly doubt the Jets are going to forgive it. I wouldn't be surprised if Anita's parents end up sending her back to Puerto Rico to protect her. (And, if that happens, will Maria forgive herself for sending Anita with such a dangerous message?)
Underneath the singing and dancing and bright happy colors, this is an incredibly bleak movie. I admire that.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2016-06-18 05:14 am (UTC)Yeah, the dude who plays Tony is very "...him?" He's fine, I guess.
no subject
Date: 2016-06-18 01:06 pm (UTC)Tony seems very clean-cut 1950s boy-next-doorish, for all that he's the guy who started the Jets. On the one hand, it means that I wasn't actively anti-shipping them ("No Maria! These bad boys seem attractive, but he's bad news!), but on the other, he's just sort of bland.
no subject
Date: 2016-06-18 06:51 pm (UTC)