CHAPTER 10 Why (Low) Life Imitates Art
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emerge from interaction between criminals and the outside world:
Note:CODICI CHE SFRUTTANO IL MONDO ESTERNO
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folk stories—are sometimes recycled by criminals
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signs have nothing to do with crime.
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the influence of cinema,
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THE CASE OF JUZO ITAMI
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Japanese film director Juzo Itami
Note:GRANE CON LA Y. PUNITO X UNA SATIRA
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yakuza gangsters are depicted “as crude bullies who are outsmarted and eventually beaten by a female lawyer.”
Note:RAPPRESENTAZIONE UMILIANTE
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yakuza once were also the pampered darlings of the Japanese B-movie industry.
Note:Y COCCA DEL CINEMA
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their own code of morality,
Note:COSA POSSIEDE Y
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help the weak
Note:VIRTÚ Y
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do not contain the essential theme of social mobility but rather stress the immutability
Note:DIFFERENZA CON I WESTERN
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nostalgia for a preindustrial past.
Note:TIPICO
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Kabuki theater:
Note:FONTE D ISPIRAZ
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litanies of private argot, subtle body language,
Note:Cosa SONO QUEI FILM
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“real mobsters in Japan are among the greatest fans of this cinematic genre,
Note:I FAN
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FAN... I VERI CRIMIN
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Movies that make mobsters look vicious are actually good publicity,
Note:UNA BUONA PUBBLICITÀ
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Itami's film is unique in displaying mobsters' faults in their own professional terms.
Note:PERCHÈ Y SE L È PRESA
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Roberta Torre's farcical musical (Tano to Die For), a parody of Sicilian mafiosi,
Note:ALTRO CASO PIÚ UNICO CHE RARO
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her film also makes fun of the antimafia people,
Note:REAZIONE DIVERSA... Il FILM LA BUTTA IN CACIARE
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paid 15,000 euros to the boss of La Vucciria,
Note:LA PRODUZIONE...
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EXTORTION AND PROTECTION
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In order to shoot in peace and enjoy the collaboration of the locals,
Note:PAGARE X GIRARE A HK
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the crew came under pressure from locals
Note:DICE TK PER IL SG
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“You are taking pictures of my windows and you must pay
Note:ARGOMENTI USATI
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the crowd gets out of the camera's way and everybody becomes cooperative. Sometimes the Carabinieri themselves
Note:SE IL BOSS BENEDICE LE RIPRESE
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The industry itself has often used “muscle” to control its labor force or stifle the competition.
Note:UTILIZZO DELLA MAFIA
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Anthony Quinn in a show of solidarity with the Gambino family boss. Rourke said that he and “Mr. Gotti were friends.
Note:SODALIZIO STAR MAFIOSI
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few cases of mobsters turning into producers.
Note:IL CASO ESTREMO
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The main business of a well-functioning mafia is protection,
Note:MEGLIO LA DIVISIONE DEL LAVORO
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are small, there are low entry costs, they are unionized, they have lots of unskilled labor, and they need low technology.
Note:I SETTORI CHE ATTRAGGONO LA MAFIA.... I B MOVIE RIENTRANO
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ART IMITATES LOW LIFE
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Scriptwriters have ransacked the underworld for stories. Nick Pileggi,
Note:STORIE VERE SACCHEGGIATE
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Wiseguys and Casino,
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Donnie Brasco,
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“read his way through a mountain of Senate hearings
Note:IL PUZO DEL PADRINO
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1990s, the FBI tapped the phones of some New Jersey mafiosi.
Note:MAFIOSI VERI CHE CRITICANO I FINTI
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The crew of The Godfather and its actors happily communed with the “boys.” James Caan was seen in the company of Carmine “The Snake” Persico so often that the FBI thought he was part of that crew.
Note:MAFIOSI FINTI VCHE FTREQ MAF VGERI
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“Now, why couldn't you have made me more sympathetic?
Note:LA TELEFONATA DEL MAFIOSO VERO
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A whole demimonde has grown around the industry of mob movies,
Note:IL MONDO DEI CONTATTI
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Liz Hurley, the British actress who produced Mickey Blue Eyes, “lavishes praise on Musacchia, whom she refers to as the link between the likes of Al Pacino, Johnny Depp and Barry Levinson and the kind of men who could be on F.B.I. surveillance lists.”
Note:ELOGIO DI MUSACCHIA IL LINK DEI DUE MONDI
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There are a “tiny” number of men with a criminal past “who are getting parts
Note:NNOSTANTE IL LINK
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there is no record of serious actors becoming mobsters.
Note:VALE ANCHE L INVERSO
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Noboru Ando, once the boss of a Tokyo crime family,
Note:ECCEZINE
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“All yakuza have to be actors to survive”
Note:TUTTI I M. SONO UN PO ATTORI
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the last thing they want is to be seen as impostors.
Note:ATTORI KA NN IMPOSTIRI. X QS STANNO LONYANI DAL CINE
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LOW LIFE IMITATES ART
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Swiss accounts used one of two code names—Kaiser for those opened by Ibrahim Abacha and Soze for his brother Mohammed.
Note:IL NOME DATO AI CONTI DALLA M. NiGERIANA
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doing like in the book…. They disguised themselves as doctors and killed [Candido Ciuni, a hotel manager] in his [hospital] bed.”
Note:IMITATW LE AZIONI DEL DRINO
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they followed “the same technique we saw in films.”
Note:LE BRIGATE ROSSE SI FINANZ CON LE RAPINE
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takes his life to make sure his relatives will not suffer from his behavior.
Note:UNA TECNICA INAUGURATA NEI FILM...IL SUICIDIO
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He believed that a Hollywood genre he calls the “comedy of apocalypse” may have been a contributory factor in the staging of the 9/11 terrorist attacks
Note:ALTMAN SUL 9/11
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‘Haven't they ever heard of the Bill of Rights? Tell them to go over there and read it.’ In 1959, when Rod Steiger played Al Capone, he used the same line.”
Note:LOCASIO RIPETE LE PAROLE DI AL CAPONE
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CONVENTIONS
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criminals need conventional signals to communicate
Note:IL PROBLEMA DEL COOR...IL CINEMA PROVVEDE
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Movies can accidentally offer some solutions
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The soundtrack acts as an icon that gives a clear meaning without constituting evidence of affiliation.
Note:SIGNIFICATO SENZA EVISENZA
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1912
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Musketeers of Pig Alley,
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the protagonists wear suits and hats, and that Al Capone and the Chicago mob adopted the movie tradition.
Note:AIL GUARDAROBA DEL GANGSTER... UN FILM SEMINALE
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Without movies we would still have gangsters. We did have them. But without films, mobsters would need different sources for their conventional signals.
Note:UN MONDO SENZA FILM
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Knowing how to behave has been a serious headache for the many new gangs that have sprouted in Russia since 1989.
Note:IN RUSSIA NIENTE FILM... Si IMITA L AMERICA
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Others in Russia have looked to Sicily, as mediated by fiction, as a source of inspiration.
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transmitting conventional codes to younger
Note:ALTRA FUNZIONE ASSOLTA DAL CINEMA
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would-be mobsters
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Le Carré said that young spies have looked at his books as a source on which to tailor their demeanor and vocabulary.
Note:IL CINEMA HA UN RUOLO PREMINENTE NELLE PROFESSIONI DOVE IL SEGRETO È TUTTO
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“went to work on a college internship for an investment bank in New York.
Note:COME DEVO VESTIRMI?…GUARDA I FILM GIUSTI
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“The Medieval European aristocrats, from the 13th century on, emulated the actions they admired in books.
Note:ANCHE NEL MEDIOEVO
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having commonly shared and stable conventions.
Note:QUANDO L ARTE È IMPORTANTE...PRIMA CONDIZIONE
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need for secrecy,
Note:SECONDA
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ADVERTISING
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Mobsters benefit from and revel in the publicity they vicariously get from movies about them.
Note:I FILM SONO LA PUBBLICITÀ DELLA MAFIA
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inform their own audience that they are those whom the movie really talks about—
Note:A VOLTE IL PRODOTTO SEGUE LA PUBBLICITÀ
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Lucky Luciano
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His contribution to local culture was to provide financial backing for the opening of the first cinema in the village.
Note:LL INVESTE NEI CINEMA
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best free mafia advertising is undoubtedly The Godfather.
Note:IL PICCO
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Sammy “The Bull” Gravano,
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saw The Godfather in 1972, and later acknowledged that “[Puzo] influenced the life, absolutely.”
Note:SG STREGATO DAL PADRINO
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Louise Milito,
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Louie watched it like six thousand times.
Note:UN ALTRO STREGATO DAL PADRINO
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it boosted their sense of their own legitimacy.
Note:IL PADRINO LEGITTIMAW
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John Abbott, director general of the British National Criminal Intelligence Service, has openly blamed films, such as Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, both by director Guy Ritchie, for glamorizing and thus encouraging organized crime.
Note:ACCUSE AI FILM GLAMOUR SUL CRIMINE
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That's just like I felt when I killed Joe Colucci.
Note:GRAVANO SI IDENTIFICA
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The Godfather transfixed not just the Italian American mobsters or their Sicilian cousins. Denizens of the underworld loved it in Hong Kong, in Japan, and in Russia—for all of whom the film was even less realistic. According to Nikolai Modestov, the mobsters of Sergei Frolov's Balashikha gang could recite parts of the Godfather films by heart.89 It was a truly global movie,
Note:UNIVERSALITÀ DEL PADRINO
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In 1999, discussing the movie with Jeffrey Goldberg, Steven Kaplan, allegedly John Gotti Jr.’s bodyguard, revealed how much the film is valued by its models to this day: One evening earlier this month, while debating the strengths of various mob movies, Kaplan lavishly praised “The Godfather.” I [Goldberg] countered that “The Godfather,” while hugely entertaining, kept alive destructive myths, and suggested “Donnie Brasco” as a compelling depiction of hard-luck mob life. It is for this reason that “Donnie Brasco” is not popular in certain circles. Kaplan's eyes grew beady, and he said, very slowly, in a manner meant to preclude further dissent, “The Godfather” is a better movie.93
Note:PADRINO VS DONNIE BRASCO NELL IMMAGINARIO CRIMINALE
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Goodfellas, by Pileggi and Scorsese, is a much more realistic movie also, which, as film critic Jim Shepard said, is “littered with the corpses of guys who thought they were in a movie called The Godfather”
Note:GOODFELLAS: FILM SU MAFIOSI CHE VIVONO COME SE FOSSERO IN UN FILM
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Donnie Brasco is arguably one of the best mob movies ever made on the subject (it took a British director who went to public school to portray effectively this society of men, their weaknesses and quirks, the mutual intimidation, the paranoia, the subjugation, the displays of power). But precisely because of its realism, because it portrays a case in which mobsters were conned by an astute undercover agent, it is unpopular with gangsters. Advertising is not supposed to dwell on shortcomings.
Note:DONNIE RONNIE ASCO. TROPPO REALISTICO PER FARE DA PUBBLICITÀ
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According to James Gandolfini, the actor who played Tony Soprano, the series was closely monitored by mobsters, who did not hesitate to pass their verdicts on the show and let the actors know if their behavior did not ring true.
IL VIA LIBERA DEI BOSS AI SOPRANO
