The Phenix City Story
The Phenix City Story
History and Fiction (Film), Civil Rights, and the Last Days of Pompeii
In Phil Karlson’s The Brothers Rico (1955), Eddie Rico is a legitimate businessman who cannot extricate himself from the tentacles of the syndicate. Stylistically speaking, The Brothers Rico mirrors the emerging impact of television on the classic noir series registered most dramatically in Jack Arnold’s 3-D noir, The Glass Web (1953). However, if the camera setups in Karlson’s film appear more functional than not relative to ’40s classic noir, Bernard Guffey’s cinematography is inseparable from the film’s conceit: that organized crime is indistinguishable from corporate America. The South Floridian setting of The Brothers Rico is central to its sun-drenched, coruscating vision of late ’50s America. Unlike The Enforcer and The Captive City, which are set in the East and Midwest, respectively, Karlson’s film is set in the South, the West, and the Southwest. These sunbelt locations may seem antithetical to the inky-black look of classic noir, but the reason is as simple as it is profound: crime is not just here or there; it’s everywhere.
Keywords: Exposé, film noir, family, organized crime, television, gangster
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