CITYist

The iconic American teenage film has taken a swan dive in recent years, making it difficult to imagine how somewhat intelligent, eloquent films like “American Graffiti” or “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” ever made it into popular consciousness. Less talked about, however, are two beautiful films that Francis Ford Coppola churned out in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1983. Retaining the same production crew and even some of the same cast, Coppola directed the deeply American tale of class oppression “The Outsiders” as well as the deeply artistic, European-influenced “Rumble Fish.”

Coppola’s star of choice was Matt Dillon, then a young Adonis whose chiseled face and mixture of passion and impulsiveness made him a picture of youthful rage. In “The Outsiders,” based off the novel written by S.E. Hinton, Dillon plays bad boy Dallas Winston, one of the wrong-side-of-the-tracks Greasers who battle against the upper class “Socs” (a shortened version of “social”). The movie features an incredible roster of future talent, including Patrick Swayze, Tom Cruise, Rob Lowe, Ralph Macchio (yes, the “Karate Kid”), C. Thomas Howell, Emilio Estevez and Diane Lane. Like all the great teenage films, “The Outsiders” does not condescend to its subjects, instead treating the story with the same respect as a classic John Steinbeck novel.

During production on “The Outsiders,” Coppola decided to adapt another Hinton book, Rumble Fish. The two worked on the script on days off from “The Outsiders,” and kept Dillon and Lane on in starring roles. They were joined by a young Mickey Rourke, before he had decided to destroy his face, as well as Nicolas Cage, Dennis Hopper and Laurence Fishburne.

“Rumble Fish” is by far the more avant-garde of the two films, taking its style from the French New Wave and German Expressionism. It retains all the dark shadows and smokiness of “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” and the conversational ebb and flow of “Breathless”—creating a beautiful, complex black and white film with a loose narrative structure and heavy symbolism. In the movie, the only things shown in color are the “rumble fish,” or Chinese fighting fish, which Rourke’s character believes will not fight each other if only they’re set free in the wild. There’s a message here about youth, fighting and group mentality—Dillon’s character, Rusty James, mourns the end of the “gang days”—and also of freedom and independence. It’s rather heavy stuff for the average filmgoer, especially one who expected another teenage greaser film. “Rumble Fish” was largely panned—but in essence, it’s no less accessible than, say, “Mean Streets.” If you love film, and would like to see American teenage cinema free of clichés and mindless humor, Netflix both of these movies stat.