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Italian-Americans in Film:
From Immigrants to Icons
Carlos E. Cortes
Universityof California,Riverside

"The Godfatheris a fictional account of the activities of a small group of

ruthless criminals. It would be erroneous and unfair to suggest that they
are representative of any ethnic group."

Intoned by a solemn voice and emblazoned on millions of television

screens throughout the United States, these words preceded the 1977
showing of Francis Ford Coppola's The GodfatherSaga (a revised and
expanded version of the two theatrical motion pictures, The Godfatherand
The Godfather:PartII). Forewarned that the characters were not "represen-
tative of any ethnic group," a nationwide television audience then
watched the violent, multi-generational saga of the Corleone family.
Much of the early part of the film took place in Sicily, large segments of
the film were spoken in Italian with English subtitles, and most of the
characters bore such names as Barzini, Clemenza, Brasi, and Tattaglia.
No problem. The disclaimer had guaranteed that viewers would not
mistake them as members of any specific ethnic group.
The Godfatherdisclaimer has become a landmark in the history of the
film depiction of Italian-Americans, as well as ethnic groups in general,
reflecting a growing awareness of the power of the media to influence
audience thinking and public beliefs. It also represented an effort, albeit
ineffective, to address this media educational power, although the inser-
tion of the disclaimer can be interpreted either positively as an honest
attempt to mute the deleterious side-effects of the film or negatively as
cynical posturing to blunt criticism by Italian-American groups. Moving
beyond the confines of Italian-Americana, that statement established a
media disclaimer model, which has been copied and only slightly modi-
fied in later controversial films that similarly presented other ethnic
groups as criminally violent, such as the 1983 Scarface(Cuban-Americans)
and the 1985 Year of the Dragon (Chinese-Americans). In short, the dis-
claimer demonstrated a recognition that entertainment films do, in fact,
teach, possessing the power to create, reinforce, and modify public
images about ethnic groups, including Italian-Americans.
MELUS, Volume 14, Nos. 3-4 (Fall-Winter 1987).
108 CARLOSE. CORTES

Moreover, The Godfather epitomized Hollywood's relentless iconiza-

tion of film Italian-Americans not only as popular cultural embodiments
of their ethnic group, but also as symbols for the ethnic experience in
general, particularly for the extra-legal quest for the American Dream.
Italian-Americans have become, in fact, a synonym for screen criminal-
ity. Provide characters with Italian surnames, and the burden of proving
innocence falls on them. Expect at any moment an ominous offer that
better not be refused. The post-Godfathermovie trajectory of Italian-
Americans has been, to a great extent, an offshoot or a response to this
icon-solidifying masterpiece, a film that in itself integrated the major
threads of seventy years of U.S. screen treatment of Italian-Americans.

LAUNCHING OF THE IMMIGRANT FILM (1900-1928)

During the first two decades of the silent era, Italian-Americans and
other European immigrants became a favorite motion picture topic. In
general, films portrayed European immigrants in jocular terms, as people
with odd, quaint, humorous customs, but customs that could be "cured"
with the proper dose of Americanization. In fact, learning to be Ameri-
can became a common subtext of these early immigrant films.1
At times, as in EleventhHouse, The Organ Grinder (1909), Tony America
(1918), and the early minor classic, TheItalian(1914), laughter gave way
to seriousness. In the latter, for example, an Italian immigrant couple
struggles to build a new life on New York City's Lower East Side.
However, their efforts end in tragedy when their baby becomes sick and
dies during a heat wave, as poverty prevents them from obtaining the
hygenic food needed to pull him through the crisis.
Movies like TheItalianprovided a more solemn look at the underside of
the immigrant experience, in which slums, poverty, low-paying jobs, and
societal prejudice impeded the progress and sometimes even threatened
the survival of Italian-Americans and other immigrants. However, so
some movies proclaimed, these obstacles could be overcome by a com-
mitment to becoming American, a strong tug at one's own bootstraps,
and the appropriate helping hand from concerned mainstream Ameri-
cans. In fact, film Italian-Americans occasionally achieved the American
Dream, like dressmaker Tito Lombardi in Lombardi, Ltd.(1919). In the
1918 comedy, My Cousin(1918), the great Italian tenor, Enrico Caruso,
plays the dual roles of two upwardly-mobile Italian immigrant cousins,
one an operatic tenor, the other a struggling (and ultimately successful)
sculptor.
These gently humorous, occasionally serious portrayals of Italian-
Americans and other European immigrants stood in sharp contrast to
the film depictions of "colored"Americans - blacks, Mexican-Ameri-
ITALIAN-AMERICANS IN FILM 109

cans, Indians (Native Americans), and Asian-Americans - who fared

much worse at the hands of early U.S. filmmakers. While these colored
ethnics, like their white ethnic compatriots, could also be humorous,
their deviant behavior seemed more genetically rooted and, therefore,
not generally salvageable through Americanization. Moreover, their
color would forever set them apart from other Americans. Silent screen
colored ethnics operated anti-socially and resorted to far more violence
than did white ethnics. Mexican bandits, bloodthirsty Indians, inscruta-
ble dope-peddling Chinese-Americans, and (institutionalized in 1915 by
TheBirthof a Nation)brutish, sexually unrestrained blacks became com-
monplace on screen. Italian-Americans seldom participatedin such silent
film social deviance; their days of widespread screen gangsterism would
not arrive until the 1930s.
World War I began to change American society's vision and, likewise,
filmdom's stance toward Italian-Americans and other white ethnics.
With World War I, mainstream Americans became increasingly con-
cerned about the presence and apparent strength of alien cultures in
their midst. Particularly threatening stood German-Americans, whose
foreign language schools, churches, clubs, and newspapers suddenly
became anathema. With Germany as our nation's prime wartime enemy,
could German-Americans be trusted? What about the loyalty of those
ensconced in other ethnic cultural pockets?
Reacting to concerns about this newly-highlighted (but certainly not
new) ethnic presence, Congress passed a series of laws intended to
temper America's foreign element. The Federal Immigration Laws of
1921 and 1924 placed severe restrictions on European immigration,
particularly from southern and eastern Europe, including Italy. Main-
stream Americans tended to view people from those areas as the least
desirable European ingredients in the supposed American melting pot.
Bilingual education programs, then particularlywidespread throughout
the midwest, were scuttled, while state after state passed laws restricting
the use of languages other than English in schools.
As part of this new rage for rapidAmericanization, Hollywood movies
carried a three-fold message. First, white ethnics, formerly cuddly and
humorous, could also be downright unsavory. Among Italian-Ameri-
cans, such screen characters ranged from the bomb-throwing labor
radical, Sophia Guerni, in the 1919 DangerousHours(which launched a
vigorous simultaneous attack on foreignness, feminism, and labor acti-
vism), to the lascivious merchant, Arno Riccardi, in Manhandled (1924).
Second, with foreign characteristics no longer so cute, white ethnics
should become Americanized, quickly. Hollywood also provided the
obvious solution: upward mobility through hard and honest work.
Third, intermarriage could serve as a short-cut to Americanization and
110 CARLOS E. CORTES

the removal of the remaining vestiges of foreignness ... if not always

totally effective for the couple, more likely for their children. Yet be
careful whom you marry. Most filmic intermarriages of the 1920s paired
white ethnics of different foreign derivations. Seldom did movies cele-
brate the marriage of an Italian-American to a mainstream English-
descent American (and interracialmarriage remained totally unacceptable
as screen fare).
Throughout the silent era, then, Italian-Americans served as the
quintessential example of the European immigrant. Armed with exotic
surnames and manacled by traditional ethnic customs, sometimes anti-
social and sometimes the victims of unfortunate economic conditions,
occasionally successful in achieving full Americanization and the Ameri-
can Dream, screen Italian-Americans embodied the white immigration
experience. But the 1930s would bring a new and, for Italian-Americans,
ominous twist in their screen persona, a giant step toward becoming an
undesired screen icon.2

SOUND AND THE BIG BANG (1928-1945)

The coming of sound to motion pictures in the late 1920s and the
arrivalof the Great Depression combined to create a veritable revolution
in Hollywood filmmaking. Sound gave Hollywood the capacity to
heighten impact through spoken dialogue, fully-orchestrated recorded
music, and often-jarring sound effects. At the same time, the depression
forced Hollywood to contend with the dramatically changing social
conditions. Many filmmakers responded by grinding out escapist enter-
tainment to draw diversion-seeking Americans into the theatre. Others
attempted to engage the depression seriously, including the societal
problems that both contributed to and resulted from the catastrophic
economic collapse. Italian-Americans played a key role in many such
films, especially in social dramas.
Hollywood had long been fascinated with crime.3 After all, crime
meant conflict, and conflict attracted audiences. But with the depression,
this fascination with crime became focused on the special problem of
gangsterism, particularly ethnic gangsterism as a barometer of the
nation's social ills. In the forefront of Hollywood's inspection of gangster-
ism stood three ethnic groups: Chinese-Americans, in such films as
Chinatown Nights (1930) and The Mysterious Mr. Wong (1935); Irish-
Americans, in movies like Public Enemy (1931) and The Roaring Twenties
(1939); and, most extensively and totemically, Italian-Amerians.4
In fact, Italian-American gangsters became a major film personifica-
tion of America's social failures, including the crisis of the increasingly
elusive American Dream. Frustrated in their efforts to grasp The
ITALIAN-AMERICANS IN FILM 111

Dream, movie Italian-Americans turned to illegal avenues in their quest

for pride, power, and prosperity. Led by two iconographic screen figures,
Edward G. Robinson's Caesar Enrico Bandello (LittleCaesar- 1930) and
Paul Muni's Antonio Camonte (Scarface - 1932), motion picture Italian-
Americans became the epitome of screen gangsterism.5
Italian-American film hoodlums ran from the serious (murderous
bank robber Tony Garotta in the 1931 NightRideand reformed mobster
"LittleJohn" Sarto in the 1940 BlueOrchid)to the humorous (bumbling
bootlegger Remy Marco in the 1938 A SlightCaseofMurderand comically
incompetent gang leader Gordoni in the 1938 Manhattan Merry-Go-Round).
Nor was criminality limited to men. Following in the footsteps of Danger-
ousHours'Sophia Guerni came such underworld figures LittleCaesar'sMa
Magdalena. This widespread screen celebration of Italian-American
gangsters established a screen pattern to which filmmakers have con-
tinued to turn, a tradition that survives to the present.
Yet these Italian-American gangsters embodied more than the inher-
ent (implicitly genetic) evilness of film Mexican bandits and Indian sav-
ages. Movie Italian-Americans may have been violent and willing, often
eager, to engage in illegal means of striving for The Dream. However,
they also sometimes emerged as victims, or at least as examples of the
failings of American society. Italian-American gangsters occasionally
became both victims and victimizers, basically decent people who chose
criminality out of frustration over the apparent obstacles to legitimately-
attained success, criminals to be pitied as well as feared. However, the
Motion Picture Production (Hays) Code's requisite "crime-does-not-
pay" movie endings argued that they should not be imitated.6
But in these gangster movies, rationalizations of context and causality
took a back seat to criminal sensationalism. Even when films provided a
modicum of social analysis, they put their main emphasis on staccato
violence, reinforced by the wonders of sound, which gave the omnipres-
ent machine gun an ear-shattering reality. Only the whoops of Holly-
wood's blood-thirsty Indians could rival Italian-Americans' machine
guns as movie sound's contribution to the image of ethnic violence.
Not all social realism movies about Italian-Americans indulged in
violence. Some Italian-American screen figures, along with other white
ethnics, emerged as decent, estimable, law-abiding citizens, as in the
1939 screen adaptation of Clifford Odets' GoldenBoy(while it did include
mobster EddieFoseli) and the 1940 film version of Sidney Howard's They
KnewWhatTheyWanted.In the latter, Antonio Patucci earned both respect
and sympathy as a hard-working, if highly emotional, grape grower in
California's Napa Valley. Moreover, Patucci's marriage to an Anglo girl
- admittedly a poor one - symbolized the growing screen acceptability
of white ethnic-Anglo intermarriage.
112 CARLOSE. CORTES

This new integrationist acceptabilitysurfaced in other 1930s films, like

Kid Galahad (1937). The latter blended intermarriage with Italian-
American criminality, as crooked boxing manager Nick Donati tries to
douse the growing love between his younger sister and rising boxer
Ward Guisenberry (Kid Galahad). However, after Donati dies following
a shoot-out with another crooked fight manager, the two young people
appear headed for marriage, providing both a happy ending and a further
integrationist message.
Although throughout Hollywood history films about Italian-Ameri-
cans have overwhelmingly focused on men, Italian-American women
began achieving a more extensive screen presence during the 1930s.
Unfortunately, while Italian-American movie men grativated toward
gangsterism, Italian-American screen women also became increasingly
categorized - as broken-English-speaking, often temperamental earth
mothers. Whether consoling their wayward children (the repentant
get-away car driver's mother in Scarface)
or berating them in public (gang
leader Gordoni's mother in Manhattan Merry-Go-Round),they exuded a
power of personality, even if that power proved to be more surface and
volatile than rooted and effective.7
World War II brought Italian-Americans even further into the filmic
mainstream. With the United States at war, Hollywood joined the effort.
War movies called out to Americans of all backgrounds to enter the
military and fight for their country. It became a standard part of Holly-
wood's "affirmative action policy" to make certain that nearly every
filmic military unit displayed a virtual ethnic mosaic, complete with at
least one Polish-American, one Hispanic-American, one Irish-American,
one Jewish-American and, of course, at least one Italian-American.
But in terms of the Italian-Americanimage, Hollywood's World War II
had a foreign-heritage downside. Mussolini's Italy was one of our ene-
mies. While Italian-Americans served the United States with dedication
and often with heroism, the Italianmilitary opposed us. Yet, according to
Hollywood, what opponents! Hollywood's Italianarmies come off as less
vigorous than those of Japanand Germany, with Italian soldiers gener-
ally pompous, stupid, incompetent, and even cowardly (not much good
for anything except singing Italian songs, as in the 1943 FiveGravesto
Cairo).World War II, then, provided conflicting contributions of bravery
and cowardice to the contours of the Italian-American (and the related
Italian) film image.

VICTIMS, VICTIMIZERS AND VICTORS (1945-1970)

Hollywood's wartime crusading zeal did not end with the conclusion
of military hostilities. After all, this had not simply been a military
ITALIAN-AMERICANS IN FILM 113

struggle. It had been a war against evil, including the evil of ethnic
oppression. With the war over, Hollywood turned its attention from the
external evils of nazism and fascism to such internal evils as ethnic
discrimination and inequitable social conditions. Hollywood focused
most of its anti-prejudice attention on racism against blacks (Pinky
1949), Hispanic-Americans (A Medal for Benny - 1945), Indians (Broken
Arrow - 1950), and Asian-Americans (Bad Day at BlackRock- 1954). But
filmmakers also expressed concern about bigotry against white ethnics,
such as Jewish-Americans (Crossfire- 1947) and Polish-Amerians (Satur-
day'sHero - 1951). Italian-Americans also received attention.
At times the struggle of Italian-Americans to overcome social inequi-
ties fell gently and paradigmatically into this post-war social message
genre. Take, for example, the touching Give Us This Day (1949), based on
Christ in Concrete,Pietro di Donato's compelling autobiographical novel
about the struggle of one determined Italian-American family against
heavy societal odds. One of the most sensitive screen portraits ever
etched concerning Italian-American life, the film also provides one of the
landmark portrayals of a strong, intelligent Italian-American woman.
Beginning in the 1920s, Geremio, an industrious bricklayer, and his
newly-immigrated wife, Anunciata, struggle to escape the congested
tenements of New York City's Little Italy and fulfill their dream of
buying a home in Brooklyn. After they make a 25-dollar downpayment,
Anunciata scrimps and saves in a valiant effort to amass the 500 dollars
they need in order to move into the house. The arrival of three children
slows their quest, but through great frugality she manages to accumu-
late 495 dollars, when the Great Depression deals them a devastating
blow, as Geremio cannot find work.
Their savings decline rapidly, until Geremio is offered a foreman's
position. But there is a catch. To get the contract, the contractor has had
to cut corners on safety. Distraught and torn between desperation for
his family and the reality of jeopardizing the workers' lives, Geremio
reluctantly accepts the job and convinces his friends to join him. Tragedy
strikes. One worker becomes crippled, and soon afterward Geremio dies
in a cave-in, impaled on a steel rod and buried alive in wet concrete while
shouting, "Anunciata, forgive me! I tried!" A government investigation
awards Anunciata compensation of 1,000 dollars and monthly payments
for her three children. Overcome with grief, she tells a friend, "At last
Geremio has bought us a house."
In contrast to Give Us This Day, at other times Hollywood combined
social exploration with that prototypical Italian-American domain, crim-
inality. In Knockon Any Door (1949), pretty boy Nick Romano falls into the
established film tradition of Italian-American killers. However, the film
also reveals that Romano took this criminal path partially as a result of
114 CARLOS E. CORTES

oppressive social circumstances. In fact, his environmentally-blighted life

becomes the basis for his defense attorney's passionate plea to spare
Romano's life, a plea that may ultimately gain audience sympathy for
Romano, but does not save him from execution.
Even prosecuting attorneys came to the rescue with social explana-
tions. In TheYoungSavages(1961), teenagers Anthony Dipasto and Danny
Dipaci, members of a New York City youth gang, go on trial for killing a
blind Puerto Rican boy. But "mitigating"circumstances finally surface,
when it turns out that the blind boy had been a vital member of a Puerto
Rican gang that had beaten them up. Moreover, district attorney Hank
Bell (born Bellini), himself a street product, launches the requisite court-
room attack on the social conditions that had entrapped these Italian-
American youngsters.
But most Italian-American film criminals did not benefit from such
detailed causative expositions. No circumstances mitigated the villainy of
crooked cop Johnny DiGarmo in LadyoftheLake(1946), numbers racketeer
Bill Fico in Forceof Evil (1948), or gangster Tami Giacoppetti in Detective
Story(1951). Certainly not psychopathic killer Tom Udo in Kissof Death
(1947), sadistic gang leader Johnny Rocco in KeyLargo(1948), or cruel
racketeer Servo in TheLongWait(1954). Or even comic book but murder-
ous gangsters like Spats Colombo in SomeLikeIt Hot (1959). Colorful,
dramatic, sometimes fascinating screen figures, Italian-Americancrimi-
nals had become not only a film fixture and continuous movie message,
but also an avenue to Hollywood stardom. The fine character actor
Edward G. Robinson etched a veritable sub-career in this genre, playing
Italian-American gangsters in at least nine movies.
Moreover, building from the basic Italian-Americangangster format,
post-war films featured an even more insidious variation - organized
crime with international links, as in BlackHand(1950), TheBrothers Rico
(1957), InsidetheMafia(1959), and PayorDie (1960). Such movies not only
reinforced the gangster image of the LittleCaesar/Scarfacetradition, but
also added a new dimension. Larger, better organized, and far more
brutal than their film predecessors, these Italian-Americanmovie gangs
also enjoyed venal connections with international Italian criminality, a
far cry from the bumbling Italian soldiers of World War II Hollywood
lore.
Fortunately, criminals did not monopolize post-war Italian-American
film characters, as Hollywood increasingly provided screen portraits of
good, sensitive Italian-Americans. By the early 1950s, sympathetic
Italian-American characters had even become a highway to academy
awards. In 1953, Frank Sinatra won an Oscar for his portrayal of Private
Angelo Maggio in the screen version of James Jones' FromHereto Eternity.
Loud and brash, but also loyal and goodhearted (except when called
ITALIAN-AMERICANS IN FILM 115

"wop"by sadistic Sergeant Fatso Judson), Maggio emerged as a recycled

but far more personalized version of the Italian-American soldiers of
World War II films.
Two years later movies about Italian-Americans hit the Academy
Award jackpot, as 1955's two top acting Oscars went to persons playing
Italian-Americancharacters. Ernest Borgnine (who ironicallyhad brutal-
ized Maggio as Fatso Judson in FromHeretoEternity), won for his portrayal
of Marty Piletti, the lovable but lonely New York butcher in Paddy
Chayevsky's Marty,a film that immerses itself in Italian-American cul-
ture. However, except for Marty himself, the culture comes up smelling
somewhat less sweet than a rose. Marty may be a thoughtful, sensitive
young man, but he is surrounded by less admirableItalian-Americans:an
argumentative cousin and his nagging wife; shiftless pals; and a posses-
sive mother who reveals her fear-laced bigotry when she opposes Mar-
ty's new friendship with a non-Italian-American Catholic girl whom he
had met at a public ballroom. Marty's mother and sister-in-law represent
what were becoming the two major categories of Italian-American
screen women: temperamental viragos and possessive earth mothers.
Estimable three-dimensional portraits of Italian-American women, like
Anunciata in GiveUs ThisDay, proved to be rare exceptions.
The virago-earth mother categories converged that same year in the
screen version of Tennessee Williams'TheRoseTattoo.The film gained for
Anna Magnani a Best Actress award as the neurotic Sicilian immigrant
Serafina de la Rosa, torn between the memory of her dead husband and
her repressed sexual desires. Set in a rural Louisiana community of
Italian-Americans, the movie reeks with now-predictable shrieking
women, while Serafina's suitor, Alvaro, an exuberant Italian-American
truck driver (Burt Lancaster), needs to get totally drunk in order to bring
himself to conduct a courtship with the explosive Serafina. Only her
daughter, Rosa, played with subtlety by Marisa Pavan, breaks away from
the rapidly-hardening screen stereotype of the Italian-American
woman. But Rosa is young, so she has time to learn.
One common theme connects these two award-winning films - the
impact of Americanization on the ethnic generation gap. Both Rosa and
Marty seek to escape from their ethnic cages through out-group love.
Both fall in love with Catholics, but not with Italian-Americans. In the
end, Rosa goes off to marry her blond sailor boyfriend, leaving Serafina
and Alvaro to carry out their Italian-American courtship, while Marty
calls his newly-found flame, implicitly leaving behind both his life-
wasting buddies and, possibly, his loneliness-wracked traditional Italian
mother.
Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, Italian-American screen diversity
increased. Italian-Americans could be struggling immigrants (Teresa-
116 CARLOS E. CORTES

1951) or wealthy playboys (An Affair to Remember- 1957), high school

basket cases (BlackboardJungle - 1955) or angry delinquents (Dino -
1957), unsavory press agents (SweetSmell of Success- 1957) or lovable
losers (A Hole in theHead - 1959). They could be diligent fishermen (Clash
by Night - 1952), hardworking ranchers (Wild Is the Wind - 1957), or
industrious dockworkers (A Viewfrom the Bridge- 1962). But whatever
their pursuits, they often resorted to violence, whether using their fists
to become world champion boxers (SomebodyUp ThereLikesMe - 1956) or
wielding knives to terrorize New York subways (The Incident- 1967).
While movies demonstrated Italian-American diversity, they also ele-
vated violence - physical or verbal - into the prime Italian-American
screen cultural characteristic, be it the lethal, sometimes sadistic violence
of criminals, the commercialized violence of professional boxers, or the
explosively temperamental violence of ordinary women and men.

THE ERA OF ETHNIC COMMERCIALIZATION (1970-1988)

Italian-Americans had been a popular film subject since the beginning

of movies. But the first seven decades of the twentieth century turned
out to be merely a prelude to the 1970s, which brought an explosion of
Italian-American film depictions and propelled Italian-American life and
culture into the movie forefront. To a degree, the screen treatment of
Italian-Americans reflected general trends in U.S. society, including
filmmaking. The various ethnic movements of the 1960s and early 1970s
reverberated broadly. Not only did these movements champion civil
rights, social justice, and human equality, but they also popularized the
search for and celebration of ethnic heritage, identity, and pride. Almost
overnight, millions of Americans became enchanted with the discovery
and display of their own ethnic roots. Italian-Americans did not remain
immune to this national psychic contagion. In Hollywood, they took a
leadership role.
The ethnic revival influenced Hollywood in two main ways. First,
Hollywood saw the commercial possibilities of ethnicity. Second, many
filmmakers with strong ethnic backgrounds seized this opportunity to
examine their own ethnic identities via movies. This confluence of ethnic
popularity and ethnic presence in the film industry gave rise to the
greatest boom of ethnic theme motion pictures in American film history.
However, this boom in ethnic films also coincided with yet another
major change in the American film industry, the disappearance of the
Hays Code. The bedrock of Hollywood's self-censorship system, the
Code had sanitized movies since the 1930s. Progressively losing its clout
since the 1950s, as filmmakers increasingly ignored it, the Code surren-
dered in 1968 to Hollywood's new multiple-letter rating system. Among
ITALIAN-AMERICANS IN FILM 117

other things, this meant the end of Code restrictions on sexual explicit-
ness, gratuitous violence, and the old Hollywood adage that crime could
not pay. Filmmakers vied to top each other in graphic depictions of sex
and violence, while films increasingly ended with criminals going unpun-
ished for their deeds, if not always living happily ever after. The film
intersection of ethnic revivalism and post-Hays exhibitionism led to a
movie flood of explicit ethnic sex and violence.
Italian-Americans, along with black Americans and Jewish-Ameri-
cans, headed the ethnic screen parade. Films about these three groups,
often made by group members, issued forth from Hollywood. Sparked
by the presence of a new coterie of gifted young Italian-American
filmmakers, the screen soon became filled with screaming, cursing,
battering, gun-toting, sexually-indulgent Italian-Americans.
Francis Ford Coppola's monumental The Godfather (1972), based on a
novel by another Italian-American, Mario Puzo, became the prototype
and most important legitimator of the new wave of Italian-American
sex-and-violence odysseys. TheGodfather focuses on one New York Mafia
family, headed by Don Vito Corleone (although the film avoids using the
word Mafia). Beginning in the last years of Vito's life, the film continues
through his death and the passing of the mantle to his revenge-bent son,
Michael. Moreover, the passing of the mantle also reflects a cultural
transformation. Where the movie tempers Vito's awesome power and
willingness to employ violence with Italian traditionalism - like love of
family and loyalty to friends - the thoroughly modern, semi-Anglicized
Michael emerges as icily cerebral.
Following up the enormous critical and commercial success of The
Godfather, Coppola created TheGodfather, Part11(1974). The latter served
both as a prequel, by tracing Vito's early years from his escape from Sicily
through the establishment of his ethnic crime empire in New York's
Little Italy, and as a sequel, by documenting Michael'srise, as he develops
his new crime headquarters in Nevada. Beyond its treatment of crime,
the two films delve into many other aspects of Italian-American life:
values and codes of honor; the extended family; male-female relation-
ships; cultural maintenance (epitomized by the deeply Italian Corleone
New York wedding at the beginning of TheGodfather); and acculturation
(embodied in the contrasting Anglicized Corleone Lake Tahoe wedding
of Godfather II).
While the films focus on men, Coppola's treatment of Italian-
American women continues the two basic depictions that had become
standard film fare. The older generation, the traditional earth mothers,
provide passive and stoic support for their men. The younger genera-
tion, the modern nags, become Italian-Americanspoiled brats, as person-
ified by Don Vito's daughter, Costanza.
118 CARLOSE. CORTES

Overall, the two Godfatherfilms stand as an extraordinary cinematic

achievement. One of the richest and most incisive portrayals of Italian-
American life yet captured on film, these movies went well beyond
Italian-Americana. Throughout Coppola used the Mafia as a metaphor
for the American quest for wealth and power, in which the Mafia
symbolizes the successes and excesses of American big business.8
The accuracy or ethnic authenticity of these two films may be debated,
but their power as public image-makers remains uncontestable. Evi-
dence of the effects of the Godfatherfilms soon emerged, ranging from a
boom in Mafia jokes and Mafia Staff Car bumper stickers to the public
institutionalization of the expression, "I'mgoing to make you an offer you
can't refuse." If anybody doubted that being Italian-American was virtu-
ally synonymous with having criminal connections (not necessarily
being a criminal yourself), The Godfatherput those reservations to rest. As
movie figures, Italian-Americans had become screen and social icons.
Moreover, The Godfatherfilms made money, lots of it. This sent a
further message to the rest of Hollywood: there's gold in them there
Mafia movies. Hollywood responded with film after film about the Mafia
or other Italian-American criminal agglomerations referred to more
generically as the mob or organized crime: TheDon Is Dead (1973), CrazyJoe
(1974), Mr. Majestyk(1974), Capone(1975), SilverBears(1978), Gloria(1980),
Absenceof Malice (1981), The CottonClub (1984), The Popeof GreenwichVillage
(1984), Codeof Honor(1985), Heat (1987), and The Untouchables(1987). As did
The Godfather,a few of these and other motion pictures, notably Martin
Scorsese's brilliant Mean Streets(1971), seriously explored broader aspects
of the Italian-American experience, in which the Mafia served as only
one element. But other movies simply exploited that experience, using
the Mafia as the audience-titillating centerpiece.9
By 1985 the mafioso image had become so solid that John Huston
could use the movie audience's "knowledge" of Italian-Americans and
turn the Mafia theme on its head in the sardonic Prizzi'sHonor. In some
respects, Prizzi'sHonorprovided a reaffirmation of the iconic solidity of the
mafioso image. However, it did so by playing off, manipulating, and even
caricaturing assumed audience stereotypes, the ultimate paean to the
image-building effectiveness of its movie predecessors. That movie
Mafia chic had now added a new dimension - Mafia parody chic - can
be seen in such ensuing parodies as Wise Guys (1986) and Married to the
Mob (1988).
Further proof of the stereotype's pervasiveness came from other
sources. Films not even about Italian-Americans, at least as a principal
theme, often included them as subsidiary criminal characters, even
though their being Italian-American had no importance for the plot line
(in contrast, for example, to films about the Mafia, which make the
ITALIAN-AMERICANS IN FILM 119

Italian-American presence necessary). Throw-away Italian-American

criminals - those whose ethnic identification had no plot significance-
ranged from pimp DeLuca in The Gauntlet(1977), drug pusher DeMesta
in Just You and Me, Kid (1979), and mob gambler Tony Paoli in Any Which
Way You Can (1981) to the sadistic Severo in The Hot Touch(1982), pimp
Guido in Risky Business (1983), and counterfeiter Knobby de Karno in
Burglar(1987). Even female criminals, from mob hitwoman Sciloni in The
Sting (1973) to crude, buffoonish gang leader Ma Fratelli in Goonies(1985),
found themselves labeled gratuitously as Italian-American.
All of these characters could just as easily have been of some other
background. Yet the filmmakers decided to make them Italian-Ameri-
cans, taking advantage of audience predispositions, meaning Italian-
American stereotypes solidified by previous films. Conditioned by
movies to reflexively link Italian-Americans with criminality, violence,
and temperamentality, movie audiences could be expected to respond
predictablyto criminal characters labeled Italian-American.With charac-
ter development unnecessary, surnames and ethnicity would serve the
Pavlovian role. Lazy filmmaking, certainly, but a type of stereotype-
based, stereotype-reinforcing filmmaking that has been a Hollywood
tradition since the introduction of the Indian savage and Mexican bandit
villains of early silent movies. In this case, Italian-Americans have been
the iconic victims.
Confronted by this challenge to their public image, Italian-Americans
responded both as individuals and through organizations. Their protests
rang general in nature, decrying the hyperbole, unrepresentativeness,
and repetitiveness of the mafioso screen theme. But their protests also
took special aim at major Mafia movies, like The Godfather,made by
Italian-Americans themselves. Self-portrait posed the greatest threat to
the Italian-American public image, since such films carried the trappings
of insider knowledge, adding legitimacy to their presentations.10
Faced with this outcry from elements of their own community,
Italian-American filmmakers, actors, and writers defended their movies
as merely slices of Italian-Americanlife, which happened to include por-
trayals of the decision and efforts by someItalian-Americans to seek the
American Dream by extra-legal, sometimes violent means.1' Like their
filmic heirs, such as Antonio "Scarface"Camonte, Little Caesar Bandino,
and Pretty Boy Nick Romano, they were forced by circumstances - if
not forced, at least left with limited options - to turn to crime as a way of
striving for The Dream.
Next to Coppola, the most important recent figure in forming the
Italian-American screen image has been Martin Scorsese, particularly
through his Mean Streetsand Raging Bull (1978).12 Both Mean Streets,an
affecting portrait of a group of second-rate young hoods in New York's
120 CARLOS E. CORTES

Little Italy, and RagingBull, an arresting biography of former middle-

weight boxing champion JakeLaMotta, featured the splattering of blood
and joltingly earthy language. Moreover, Scorsese exceeded Coppola in
his depressing portrayal of Italian-Americanwomen. More than scream-
ing nags, Scorsese's Italian-American women tended to be neurotic,
incompetent, and generally undependable.
Although not all Italian-American experience films dealt with gangs,
even many that did not address gangsterism per se still portrayed Italian-
American men as having a penchant for violence, a la RagingBull. In
FightingBack (1982), when John D'Angelo sets out to clean up his Phila-
delphia neighborhood, he resorts to vigilantism. Elsewhere in Philadel-
phia, that overachieving Italian-American slugger with soul, Rocky Bal-
boa, makes his strongest points with his fists, beginning with Rocky
(1976), while Sylvester Stallone's other famous screen persona, the
angst-ridden social misfit, Rambo (although not specifically identified as
Italian-American), has lowered gratuitous violence to new levels.'3 Even
Daniel La Russo, The KarateKid (1984), has to achieve status by cleaning
up on community bullies, first in Los Angeles and later in Okinawa in The
KarateKid, Part 11 (1986).
The 1978 Bloodbrotherstypifies the film problem of men being both
sensitive and Italian-American. Thoughtful young Stony De Coco pre-
fers becoming a counselor, rather than pursuing his family's construc-
tion worker tradition. Yet he must convince his family and friends of the
legitimacy of his non-violent identity, in contrast to the hypertrophied
machismo of his relatives. Moreover, in the conclusion of Bloodbrothers,
even sensitive Stony ultimately has to prove his right to be non-violent
by thrashing another steel worker in mano-a-manophysical conflict.
Police films form a special violence sub-genre. Some Italian-American
film policemen demonstrate conscience and an aversion to wholesale
violence - men like Frank Serpico (Serpico- 1973) and Danny Ciello
(Princeof the City - 1981), who expose corruption among their fellow
officers, and violence-only-when-necessary Deke da Silva (Nighthawks
- 1981), who tempers his search for an international terrorist with a
concern for protecting innocent bystanders. But times change. By 1986,
Stallone, who had played da Silva, had become violence-if-at-all-possible
Lieutenant Marion Cobretti (Cobra - 1986), joined by such other
violence-prone Italian-American cops as Nico Toscani in the 1988 Above
the Law. Even on the right side of the law, film Italian-Americans
expressed their preferred motion picture form of behavior, violence.
While criminality, non-criminal propensities to violence, and female
neuroticism seem to have become the most common Italian-American
film characterizations, a fourth trend should also be mentioned - Italian-
Americans as slobs. Sometimes they are just humorous, pitiable slobs,
 IN FILM
ITALIAN-AMERICANS 121

like Fatso(1979) and good-natured, fast-eating Monty Cappalutti in Easy

Money (1983). Other times these slobs also have a seedy undertone, like
Tropo "Chuckles" Grosso, editor of the sleazy New YorkInformerin Not for
Publication(1984).
However, despite such relentless movie categorization, Italian-Ameri-
cans also benefited from a parallel counter-trend, the continuation of the
diversity tradition that had begun in the 1950s. Within this tradition
emerged a variety of strong and sympathetic Italian-American screen
characters. While these have hardly balanced the mass of Mafia movies
and other Italian-American violence portrayals, their presence remains
significant.
Italian-American women moved into professional ranks, like the con-
cerned, able Dr. Petrocelli in Tribute(1980). Tough-talking urbanites like
Stephanie Mangano (SaturdayNight Fever- 1977), although she does have
brat undertones, and sensitive Teresa Perrone (Absenceof Malice - 1981),
while she does commit suicide, at least stand as rounded characters, not
Italian-American stereotypes. And good-hearted Claudia Zimmer exhib-
its insight in recognizing that, to a degree, she remains an outsider as the
only Italian-American among the four couples who hold their traditional
gatherings in The FourSeasons(1981).
Italian-American men have reached the screen in even more diverse
roles: Phil Romano, the nostalgic ex-basketball player in That Champion-
ship Season (1982); kindly gay actor Jimmy Perino in Only When I Laugh
(1981); clothing store tycoon Thornton Melon (born Meloni) in Backto
School;young pool hotshot Vincent Lauria in The Colorof Money (1986); and
champion gymnast Steve Tevere in AmericanAnthem(1986). They include
army Major Joseph Delucca, who tries vainly to prevent the assassina-
tion of Patton in Brass Target (1978), Luigi Corelli, the self-sacrificing
Italian immigrant who dedicates himself to caring for his drug addict
Anglo society wife in A Wedding (1978), and concerned Lieutenant
Albert Minetti, who searches relentlessly and ultimately finds a kid-
napped child in Without a Trace (1983), thereby demonstrating that an
Italian-American policeman can succeed with brains without necessarily
resorting to brawn. Some of this Italian-American male diversity had
sordid elements, like Singapore whorehouse owner Jack Flowers in Saint
Jack(1979) and Italian immigrant Julian Kaye, the AmericanGigolo(1980).
Confused youth comprise a special Italian-American subculture. Some
become high school dropouts and descend from there, like Albert "Sheik"
Capadelupo in BabyIt'sYou (1983). Others struggle, discover themselves,
and ascend, like disco dancing Tony Manero (SaturdayNight Fever- 1977
and StayingAlive - 1983).
No, not all Italian-American men are gangsters or even violent, for
that matter. Nor are all Italian-Americans women simple-minded
122 CARLOS E. CORTES

shrikes. Just most of them ... at least according to Hollywood's movie

textbook of the last two decades.

THE ITALIAN-AMERICAN COUNTERATTACK

But a funny thing happened on the way to the movie theatre. While
continuing with their obsession for gangs and violence, some Italian-
American and even Italian filmmakers have expanded their spectrum to
include other ethnic groups. It may be coincidental, but between 1983
and 1985 Italian-descent directors made three major movies about non-
Italian gangs.
First off the mark came Brian De Palma with his 1983 remake of
Scarface.Depression-era Chicago's Italian-American gangster, Antonio
Camonte, became contemporary Miami's Cuban-American drug dealer,
Antonio Montana (with Italian-American Al Pacino doing the acting
honors). The post-Hays-Code Cuban-American version was even more
scurrilous, with its non-stop gutter language and self-indulgent violence
- who needs to watch an arm being cut off by a chain saw? Predictably
and justifiably, Cuban-Americans protested, but with little effect ...
except, of course, a cloned Godfather-style
film-ending disclaimerthat "the
characters do not represent the Cuban American community and it
would be erroneous and unfair to suggest that they do." Flushed with
crime-based "success," De Palma returned to Italian-Americans in 1987
with TheUntouchables, giving Al Capone the opportunity to demonstrate
his major league prowess by crushing an associate's skull with a baseball
bat during a formal dinner party.
Not to be outdone, director Michael Cimino (with help from screen-
writer Oliver Stone, who also penned Scarface), turned his ethnic angst on
New York's Chinatown with the 1985 YearoftheDragon.Chinese-Amer-
icans became Cimino's avenue for indulging in filmed ethnic violence (as
well as his usual movie-making excesses), while avoiding criticism from
Italian-Americans. Of course, he did catch it from Chinese-Americans,
who rightfully responded in angry protest, as had Cuban-Americans and
Italian-Americans before them. And, as was now becoming a cliche of its
own, YearoftheDragoncarried an on-film protestation of non-stereotyp-
ing innocence. LikeScarface, Dragonproclaimed that it was about "agroup
of ruthless criminals"who should not be perceived as being typicalof any
particular ethnic group.
Even Italian director Sergio Leone participated in this ethnic switch
with his masterful OnceUpona Timein America(1983). The film portrays
the rise of Jewish-American gangs on New York's Lower East Side
during the early twentieth century (with yet another Italian-American
actor, Robert DeNiro, as the central Jewish figure). However, despite its
ITALIAN-AMERICANS IN FILM 123

smattering of Stars of David, this fascinating film was Italian through

and through, even to Ennio Morricone's haunting score. Only the names
had been changed to protect the innocence of Italian-Americans.
Possibly, then, filmic depictions of Italian-Americans have entered a
period of transition. Italian-American gangsters increasingly share the
screen with criminals of other ethnic origins (even Prizzi's Honorhad a
Polish-American hitwoman). Italian-American cops sometimes oppose
Italian-American criminals, showing that they do not operate solely on
the underside of the law. In TheUntouchables, an Italian-American police-
man (who had changed his name from Petri to Stone to conceal his ethnic
heritage) joins the crusaders to help bring down Capone, while in Sidney
Sheldon's The Naked Face (1985), good cop Bertelli helps uncover the
Mafia-complicity of bad cop Angeli.
The 1987 Academy Awards further suggest (but do not prove) that
we may be entering a new era of Italian-American screen tale. The
success of Moonstruck - an Italian-American family tale that enchanted
audiences, won acting Oscars for Cher as Loretta and Olivia Dukakis as
Rose Castorini, and brought honors to others involved in the movie
- signals a further step in diversifying and humanizing the Italian-
American movie image. Like Prizzi'sHonor,Moonstruck massages Italian-
American stereotypes, but in this case domestic family life, not Mafia
family relations.14 Emotional and exhuberant, but tender and loving,
Moonstruck'scharacters take another step for an improved film presence.
And they do it virtually without violence. First immigrants, later criminal
and earth mother icons, with men generally having a penchant for
violence and women a tendency toward neuroticism, screen Italian-
Americans may finally be moving toward an overdue balance in their
film image.

Notes
1. Much of the evidence for this article is drawn from my Ethnicity and Foreign-
ness in Film Computer Data Bank in the University of California, Riverside's
Laboratory for Historical Research. My book-in-progress on the U.S. feature
film treatment of ethnic groups places Italian-Americans in the comparative
context of the movie depiction of other ethnic groups, while my book on the
movie treatment of foreign nations will examine the screen image of Italy as part
of the broader theme of Hollywood's changing portrayal of the world.
2. For a bibliography of books and articles dealing with Italian-Americans in film
and television see Allen L. Woll and RandallM. Miller, eds., EthnicandRacialImages
in AmericanFilmandTelevision: EssaysandBibliography
Historical (New York: Garland,
1987), 301-307.
3. Among the studies of Hollywood crime movies see: Carlos Clarens, CrimeMovies:
FromGriffithtotheGodfather andBeyond(New York: Norton, 1980); Eugene Rosow,
Bornto Lose:TheGangsterFilmin America(New York: Oxford UP, 1978); and Jack
124 CARLOS E. CORTES

Shadoian, Dreamsand Dead Ends:TheAmericanGangster/CrimeFilm (Cambridge: MIT

P, 1977).
4. The rise of the depression-era crime film is discussed in Andrew Sarris, "Big
Funerals: The Hollywood Gangster, 1927-1933," Film Comment,13 (1977), 6-9,
and Stephen L. Karpf, The GangsterFilm: Emergence,Variationand Decay of a Genre,
1930-1940, diss., Northwestern U, 1969 (New York: Arno P, 1973).
5. For an analysis of LittleCaesar,see the chapter, "The Individual Film:LittleCaesar
and the Gangster Film," in Stuart M. Kaminsky, American Film Genres:Approaches
to a CriticalTheoryof PopularFilm (New York: Dell, 1977), 23-48, and Gerald Peary,
"Rico Rising: Little Caesar Takes Over the Screen," in Gerald Peary and Roger
Shatzkin, eds., The Classic American Novel and the Movies (New York: Frederick
Ungar, 1977), 286-296. The script for LittleCaesarcan be found in Gerald Peary,
ed., LittleCaesar(Madison: U of Wisconsin P, 1981).
6. According to the 1930 Motion Picture Production Code, which went into full
effect in 1934, the movie treatment of crime could not "inspirepotential crimi-
nals with a desire for imitation" or "makecriminals seem heroic or justified."In
application, this meant that screen crime could never pay. See Motion Picture
Production Code, in Robert H. Stanley and Charles S. Steinberg, The Media
Environment:Mass Communicationsin American Society(New York: Hastings House,
1976), 81, 91.
7. An analysis of Italian-American women in motion pictures can be found in
Daniel S. Golden, "Pasta or Paradigm:The Place of Italian-American Women in
Popular Film," Explorationsin EthnicStudies,2 (1979), 3-10.
8. The Godfatherhas generated more critical debate than any other film about
Italian-Americans. Among such analyses are: Lawrence J. Dessner, "TheGod-
father, the Executive, and Art," Journal of Popular Culture, 6 (1972), 211-214;
Stephen Farber, "Coppola and The Godfather,"Sight and Sound,41 (1972), 217-223;
Giovanni Sinicropi, "The Saga of the Corleones: Puzo, Coppola and The God-
father: An Interpretive Essay," Italian-Americana,2.1 (1975), 79-90; and David
Thomson, "The Discreet Charm of the Godfather," SightandSound,47 (1978),
76-80. Also of interest is Robert K. Johnson, Francis Ford Coppola (Boston:
Twayne, 1977).
9. This cloning also occurred in published fiction. Dwight C. Smith, Jr., identified
300 Mafia theme paperback books that were issued in the first six years
following the 1969 publication of Puzo's novel. See Dwight C. Smith, Jr.,"Sons
of the Godfather: 'Mafia' in Contemporary Fiction," in ItalianAmericana,2.2
(1974), 190-207.
10. When asked to comment on the representation of Italian-Americansin his Mean
Streets,director Martin Scorsese replied, "I just wanted to be as accurate as
possible.... I wanted to make them look the way I saw them." See "Center
Honors Martin Scorsese," The Dispatch:The Newsletterof the Centerfor AmericanCulture
Studies,ColumbiaUniversity, 4.1 (1985), 14.
11. For example, see Mario Puzo, The GodfatherPapersand Other Confessions(New York:
Putnam's, 1973).
12. See, for example, Leonard Quart and Paul Rabinow, "The Ethos of MeanStreets,"
Film & History, 5 (1975), 11-15, and Mary Pat Kelly, Martin Scorsese:The FirstDecade
(Pleasantville, N.Y.: Redgrave Publishing, 1980).
13. Among the various discussions of Rockyis Daniel J. Leab,"The Blue Collar Ethnic
in Bicentennial America: Rocky,"in John O'Connor and Martin Jackson, eds.,
AmericanHistory/AmericanFilm:InterpretingtheHollywoodImage(New York: Frederick
Ungar, 1979), 257-272.
ITALIAN-AMERICANS IN FILM 125

14. A discussion of the Italian-American family figures prominently in Daniel S.

Golden, "The Fate of La Famiglia: Italian Images in American Film,"in Randall
M. Miller, ed., TheKaleidoscopic
Lens:HowHollywood ViewsEthnicGroups(Englewood,
N.J.:Jerome S. Ozer, 1980), 73-97.

Works Cited
"Center Honors Martin Scorsese." The Dispatch:TheNewsletterof The Centerfor American
CultureStudies,ColumbiaUniversity4.1 (1985): 14.
Clarens, Carlos. CrimeMovies:FromGriffithto theGodfather andBeyond.New York: Norton,
1980.
Dessner, Lawrence J. "TheGodfather, the Executive, and Art." Journalof PopularCulture6
(1972): 211-214.
Farber, Stephen. "Coppola and TheGodfather." SightandSound41 (1972): 217-223.
Golden, Daniel S. "The Fate of La Famiglia: Italian Images in American Film." The
KaleidoscopicLens:HowHollywoodViewsEthnicGroups.Ed. Randall M. Miller. Engle-
wood, N.J.:Jerome S. Ozer, 1980. 73-97.
. "Pasta or Paradigm: The Place of Italian-American Women in Popular Film."
Explorationsin EthnicStudies2 (1979): 3-10.
Johnson, Robert K. FrancisFordCoppola. Boston: Twayne, 1977.
Kaminsky, Stuart M. "The Individual Film: LittleCaesarand the Gangster Film."American
Film Genres:Approaches to a CriticalTheoryof PopularFilm.New York: Dell, 1977.
23-48.
Karpf, Stephen L. The GangsterFilm:Emergence, Variationand Decayof a Genre,1930-1940.
Diss. Northwestern U, 1969. New York: Arno P, 1973.
Kelly, Mary Pat. MartinScorsese: TheFirstDecade.Pleasantville, N.Y.: Redgrave Publishing,
1980.
Leab, Daniel J."The Blue Collar Ethnic in Bicentennial America: Rocky." Ed.John O'Con-
nor and Martin Jackson. AmericanHistory/American Film:Interpreting
theHollywood
Image.New York: Frederick Ungar, 1979. 257-272.
Peary, Gerald, ed. LittleCaesar.Madison: U of Wisconsin P, 1981.
"Rico Rising: Little Caesar Takes Over the Screen."TheClassicAmerican Noveland
theMovies.Ed. Gerald Peary and Roger Shatzkin. New York: Frederick Ungar,
1977. 286-296.
Puzo, Mario. TheGodfather PapersandOtherConfessions. New York: Putnam's, 1973.
Quart, Leonard and Paul Rabinow. "The Ethos of Mean Film& History5 (1975):
Streets."
11-15.
Rosow, Eugene. Bornto Lose:TheGangsterFilmin America.New York: Oxford UP, 1978.
Sarris, Andrew. "Big Funerals: The Hollywood Gangster, 1927-1933." FilmComment13
(1977): 6-9.
Shadoian, Jack.DreamsandDeadEnds:TheAmericanGangster/Crime Film.Cambridge: MIT P,
1977.
Sinicropi, Giovanni. "The Saga of the Corleones: Puzo, Coppola and The Godfather: An
Interpretive Essay."ItalianAmericana2.1 (1975): 79-90.
Smith, Dwight C., Jr. "Sons of the Godfather: 'Mafia' in Contemporary Fiction."Italian
Americana 2.2 (1974): 190-207.
Stanley, Robert H. and Charles S. Steinberg. TheMediaEnvironment:
MassCommunications
in
AmericanSociety.New York: Hastings House, 1976.
126 CARLOS E. CORTES

Thomson, David. "The Discreet Charm of the Godfather." Sight and Sound 47 (1978):
76-80.
Woll, Allen L. and Randall M. Miller, eds. Ethnic and Racial Images in American Film and
Television:HistoricalEssaysand Bibliography.New York: Garland, 1987.

I mustthankthe ItalianAmericanMedia Institute,the ResearchCommitteeof the Universityof Califor-

nia, Riverside, Academic Senate, and Acting Dean Carol Tomlinson-Keaseyof the UCR College of
Humanities and Social Sciencesfor grant supportfor my film research.I would also like to thank UCR
ProfessorJean-PierreBarricellifor his commentson a draftof this article,and to expressspecialappreciation
for my researchassistant,Tom Thompson,who has soably assistedmein thedevelopment of my Ethnicityand
Foreignnessin Film ComputerData Bank.