[Darby Daly]

Elia Kazan’s award winning production, On the Waterfront, is an American movie that is comparable to the classic tale of a hero. The main character, Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando), experiences a significant personality change over the course of the film. Of course, this personality change in Terry would not have been possible had it not been for Edie Doyle (Eva Marie Saint), Terry’s love interest. A key motif behind Terry’s transformation is antagonist Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb) and his mob that runs the waterfront. They are responsible for the murders of numerous men, including Edie’s brother, Joey Doyle. After taking a step back and observing all of these factors, it is clear that Kazan’s work contains a hero, a love interest, and a villain, all of which are factors of a classic hero tale.

It is interesting to see how the hero character was developed throughout this production. Terry was initially introduced as one of the villains; he had worked with Friendly and had been a part of Joey’s murder. However, the spectator can immediately see the good within Terry. While he may have been a part of the murder as he was the one who coaxed Joey out of his apartment to talk to Friendly’s’ men on the roof, he did not understand the extent of what was going to take place. Terry thought that Friendly’s men were going to ensure that Joey would not speak against Friendly in a manner that did not require murdering him.

Terry’s involvement in “solving” Joey’s murder resulted in his meeting of Joey’s sister, Edie, whom he developed strong feelings for. The relationship between these two is what really triggered Terry’s personality change. She gradually made him want to do the right thing, which included telling the truth and exposing Friendly for his crimes. If he had not fallen in love with Edie, then it would have been likely that Terry would have just gone along with Friendly’s plan as a means to avoid getting into trouble. This is a significant part of the production, as it was the reason for Terry’s transition into a hero.

In Laura Mulvey’s article, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema”, this idea is challenged as Mulvey explains ways in which the female character can be looked down upon in a production. Two of the main points that Mulvey emphasizes are that a woman is looked at as an erotic object for both the male characters and for the audience. She makes the claim that a woman’s physical appearance takes away from the development of the story. To elaborate on this, Mulvey provides a quote from film director Budd Boetticher which says,

“What counts is what the heroine provokes, or rather what she represents. She is the one, or rather the love or fear she inspires in the hero, or else the concern he feels for her, who makes him act the way he does. In herself the woman has not the slightest importance” (pg. 62).

This idea can be related to the relationship between Terry and Edie, however, Boetticher’s idea is rather extreme. While it is true that Edie provokes Terry’s’ heroism with her love, it is not true that she has no importance. Edie is one of the most important characters in the movie as she is the motivation behind Terry’s heroic change. Without Edie, there would not have been much of a plot, being that it was Terry’s falling in love with her that inspired his rebellion against Friendly.

Kazan’s On the Waterfront heavily relied on the heroine character. Despite what Mulvey is suggesting about female characters, Edie has a significant amount of importance in the development of Terry Malloy’s heroic story.

–Darby Daly

 

 

[Natalie LaCourt]

Looking at Edie as the heroine while also attempting to analyze her through the lens of Mulvey, introduces two seemingly different perspectives on the character which I thought was very interesting. Mulvey seems to argue against the notion that females can be heroes at all due to their symbolic lack of phallus, the female character is simply turned into an object of male desire, with her place “as a bearer of meaning, not maker of meaning” (834). I think you make a really good point though when you acknowledge that without Edie’s character, Terry would never have been encouraged to become the hero and been a passive, complacent character throughout. However, I think that Edie is sexualized throughout the film, for example in the scene when she is in her bed in the white dress. I think this sexualization of her character supports Mulvey because I do not think she could be a relevant character without necessarily being romantic and sexualized.

[Darby Daly]

Natalie,

I am glad that you interpreted the relationship between the Mulvey reading and On the Waterfront similarly to how I did. You pulled an interesting quote from the reading, and the idea of the female characters being viewed as an object of desire for men is something that is clearly noticeable in the movie. If it had not been for Terry’s infatuation with Edie, then he would not have become the hero character. This infatuation was driven by his attraction and sexual desire for her. You make a good point in regard to how Kazan sexualized Edie throughout the movie, especially with the scene that you described where she is in the bed with the white dress. I thought that scene was done subtly, but it was a very strong moment in the movie. However, I slightly disagree with your last comment, because I think she would be relevant, but perhaps to a different extent.

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