"Iron Selflessness" is a nostalgic gangster film that tells the story of the Prohibition Period in the 1930s in the United States. This period is a very special period in the United States. The public prohibition of alcohol has caused the proliferation of underground alcohol. Gangs in the underworld are fighting for positions. The huge profits have created a group of wealthy criminal groups. They do everything they can to keep the fat oil and water. Violence was commonplace for a while, bribery and bribery became a trend, the line between black and white was blurred, and a family of police and gangsters did not suppress evil. What happened during this period is the best material for making movies. Hollywood made a lot of films about this period. Al Kabon is really a person. He was the gang leader in Chicago at that time, and he was invincible. People even called this period the "Carbon Era". Hollywood has made more than one film about Al Kabon, some depicting him in prison to control the underworld, and some depicting his activities after he was released from prison. Elliott Nes is also a real person. He is an honest and honest agent of the Finance Bureau. It is he who has brought Kabang's tax evasion crimes to legal sanctions. Nath died in 1957, leaving no money behind. In his last days, a reporter interviewed him and wrote the book "Iron-faced Selflessness". ABC adapted it into a television series, which was broadcast for three consecutive years from 1959 to 1963.
In 1984, producer Alt Linsen asked Chicago-based playwright David Mammett to adapt the television film into a movie. Mamet has won the Pulitzer Prize. He believes that there is no dramatic climax for imprisonment for tax evasion, and in fact Nath and Kabon have never had a head-to-head confrontation. Therefore, Mamet mainly portrays two good people in the story, one is the idealist Nath, and the other is the hard-working Malong. The first draft of the script focuses on positive characters, and the story is relatively plain. In order to make the dry screenplay full of flesh and blood, Paramount hired Brian DePalma to direct it.
Prior to this, Brian DePalma had made 17 films. In the 1970s, he had made many low-cost thrillers, and he was known for being good at catering to the audience. The more famous ones are the 1976 adaptation of Stephen King’s story of the same name "Carly", the horror film "Anger" in 1978, and the 1983 remake of "Scarface". In 1980, his self-written and directed thriller "Pretend to Kill" caused a lot of controversy. Some film critics thought it was one of the most interesting movies in the past few years, but others thought it was rubbish. The shower shot of the heroine at the beginning of the film reminds people of Hitchcock's "Mentally Ill". In fact, Brian DePalma’s films have been influenced by two aspects: one is the underground films of the 1960s. Under the influence, his films are cynical, deviant, and politics are always associated with violence; the other is the Greek Ou Kirk’s movies. He likes to make Hitchcock-style horror and thriller films. The themes of his works are often persistence, lust and death. For this reason, he has been given the bad reputation of "bad imitation".
But with the accumulation of experience, De Palma has his own bold visual style. He is known for his elaborate lens design. The strong effects one after another in the film are dizzying. A director, as long as he masters a variety of visual methods, can make a boring story fascinating. "Selflessness" is De Palma's 18th film, and it is also a turning point for him. In this film, the director did not play with psychopaths, did not overly sensationalize, and all obeyed the development of the storyline. Although individual scenes have imitated predecessors, more scenes have De Palma's own characteristics.
Brian DePalma said of the film: "I want to show that corruption is nothing but failures. Those who use power for ill-gotten gains live a life of luxury and luxury, with famous paintings hanging in their residences. , They are dressed up to date, but in their hearts they also understand that they are liars and murderers." Some people say that DePalma has a fascination with blood. He was good at portraying trembling bloody violence, and now he describes it vividly.
In "Iron Face Selflessness", there are six scenes that emphasize blood. At the beginning of the film, the barber shaved Kabong and inadvertently cut a small mouth. Kabang wiped the blood with his finger, and said to the reporters surrounding him: "I grew up in the Southern District. I know that it's not good to be polite. It takes a gun and politeness to be useful." Then came Ka. Bang Ren blew up the shop that refused to buy his private wine. Here, a bit of blood on the finger heralds future violence. The second time he described blood, when Kabang learned that a batch of private wine hidden in the post office had been confiscated, he used a baseball bat to slam the man in charge of the warehouse, and the blood stained the snow-white tablecloth. At this time, overhead shots appeared on the screen, and only a large round table was seen on the table where the deceased was lying on the table, and dumbfounded people were sitting around the table. Blood is not only a means for Kabang to grab huge profits, but also a means for him to consolidate his position in the underworld. The third time was in a hut on the border. The captured gangster refused to tell the secret of the account book. So Malone stood out the window of a gangster that Nath had just killed, pretending that he couldn't force him to confess his anger, and shot him. Blood splattered on the glass windows, and the gangster in the room was so frightened that he immediately confessed. Here, Malone follows Chicago's rules of conduct, paying blood for blood. The fourth time was in the elevator, Niti, the assassin posing as a policeman, shot the witness and Wallace and wrote a big warning in blood. The fifth time was the death of Ma Long. After being seriously injured, Malone struggled to crawl back into the house from the door, trying to get the train timetable so that Nath could know where the bookkeeper was going. The place he crawled left a bloody path, as if to confirm what he had said to Nath before: taking this step, you must be ready to embark on a path of no return. Finally, at the train station, the sharpshooter Stone shot the gangster who held the bookkeeper hostage. With the bookkeeper, Kabang was finally brought to justice.
The most popular scene in "Selflessness" is the scene at the train station. The famous Odessa stairs in Eisenstein's "Battleship Potemkin" were replaced by large steps at the station, and the soldiers and the masses became very few people. When Nath and Stone arrived at the train station, they were only a few minutes away from the car, and after a while, the only bookkeeper who could prove Carbon's tax evasion was about to slip away. Nes was like an ant on a hot pot, looking nervously at the big clock and the entrance of the station. At this time, a young mother pushed an old-fashioned stroller and carried two suitcases on the stairs. She was located just within the range of the firefight. After she finally reached the top, the target Nath was waiting for appeared. The two sides began to exchange fire. When the young mother missed her hand, the stroller slid down the steps. The audience only heard the sound of the wheels when they hit each step, which seemed to be the sound of gunshots coming from a distance. The child's safety and Nath's success or failure are intertwined into a tense suspense. Here, despite the shadow of the Odessa Steps, it is full of the characteristics of De Palma.
"Selflessness" mainly portrays two loyal agents Nath and Malone. Kevin Costner, Nath’s actor, hadn’t become a famous actor shortly after his debut at the time. He has played a supporting role in De Palma's "Chill". DePalma used Costner when he couldn't hire two well-known actors, Harrison Ford and Mel Gibson, who was his first choice, and Costner became a well-known actor for starring in the film. However, the soul of the positive characters in "Selflessness" is not Nath played by Costner, but Malone played by Sean Connery. Ma Long is very good at fighting injustices, but he has seen his life through the long-term blows, and it is only under the inspiration of the passionate young man, Ness, that he regains the courage of the year. He gave Nath the way many times. After all the roads were blocked, he had to take the risk by himself and force an old policeman who had been bought by Kabang to tell the whereabouts of the bookkeeper, thus incurring the killing. In the struggle between the straight-eyed Nath and the evil Kaban who is not smiling, Ma Long is an indispensable support point full of humanity and reason. The film praises this character and establishes him as a representative of the older generation of upright law enforcement officers. Malone has a "police patron saint" on the key chain. He gave it to Nath when he died, and Nath gave it to the younger Stone at the end of the film, symbolizing Malone’s spirit of generations. Passed on from generation to generation. The veteran "007" Sean Connery, who is accustomed to playing justice defender, snatched the shots in the film.
"Iron Selflessness" is a serious production and superb performance, and Robert De Niro's performance is even more worth mentioning. In the first draft of Mammett's script, the character of Kabon has almost nothing to play. Later, Kabang’s plays were added, but the sum of several plays took less than ten minutes at best. Robert De Niro deserves to be a master of acting. He portrays Carbon's arrogance, viciousness, evil, and hypocrisy in a scene of less than one or two minutes. At the beginning of the film, it was an overhead shot of Kabang. He was lying on a large barber chair in a luxury hotel suite. One person shaved his face, another manicured his nails, and another person polished his shoes, surrounded by him. Four or five reporters, with notebooks in their hands, ready to jot down every word he said. Every time he talks loudly, he can cause a burst of flattering laughter. Afterwards, he hugged and walked downstairs after a large group of lawyers, consultants, bodyguards and so on. The two-minute play showed this gang leader's incredible appearance to the fullest. Later, when the warehouse located in the post office was confiscated and called for a meeting with his men, his ferocity was exposed. Holding a baseball bat in his hand, he paced around the big round table, talking about baseball, team spirit, and the enthusiasm that everyone deserves. All of his men were neatly dressed, sitting around the round table, nodding yes to every word he said. When he walked to the side of the man in charge of the warehouse, his face suddenly changed, showing a fierce look. He picked up a baseball bat and slammed the man on the head. The blood was spattered, and the men (and the audience) sitting around the table were all startled. Jump. At this time, Kabang became a complete beast.
Another 30-second scene fully demonstrates Kabang’s hypocrisy. After Niti killed Malone, he immediately reported to Kabang. At this time, Carbon was listening to the opera in the theater. He was moved by the sadness with tears in his eyes and took out a white handkerchief to wipe the tears. Niti murmured a few words in his ear, and the audience saw that his expression suddenly became very complicated. First, joy and sorrow were mixed, then joy overwhelming sorrow, and finally showed a triumphant smile. This short drama has become a classic, and it was still imitated 10 years later.
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