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The Untouchables Vs Godfather Analysis

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The Untouchables Vs Godfather Analysis
Exploring Good vs Evil: The Godfather vs The Untouchables

Good vs. Evil, a universal theme seen throughout the history of story telling, can find itself to be especially malleable and suprising in the modern gangster movie. In the classic depiction of this struggle, the Gangster was looked upon as the criminal, the bad guy, while today this is not always the case. In this paper I will be explaining the early gangster films restrictions on who could be good or evil, and then introduce the two films I will be comparing. After a brief summary, a comparing and contrasting will take place between them, offering insights into how the two different films offer up this classic struggle.

Early on in the gangster film genre, when the Hays Code was in effect, crime was not allowed to be something that was glamorized. The Hays Code was basically a set of moral standards films had to measure up to before being passed for distribution. It lasted from 1930 until 1968. The Hays code made things like profanity, violence, and sex completely unmentionable or undoable on the big screen. …show more content…
The story takes place in Prohibition-era Chicago, where Al Capone has the city in his back pocket, allowing his criminal activity to go completely unchecked. Capone is portrayed as the bad guy, with protagonist, Treasury Department Agent Elliot Ness, trying to figure out a way to restore order to the city. This carries the classic theme of good vs evil as the gangster portraying evil and law enforcement good, yet the twist is that most of the police force is corrupt, being bribed by Capone. Ness cannot trust anyone, and fails in his first attempt to bring Capone down by raiding one of his liquor warehouses. As the film progresses, Ness meets up with another officer who also vehemently defends righteousness, and the two begin to hatch a plan to take down Capone
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