“Keep ’Em in the East”: Kazan, Kubrick, and the Postwar New York Film Renaissance

by Richard Koszarski

The year 1955 was a watershed one for New York’s film Elia Kazan’s On the Waterfront took home eight Oscars, and, more quietly, Stanley Kubrick released the low-budget classic Killer’s Kiss . A wave of films that changed how American movies were made soon followed, led by directors such as Sidney Lumet, William Friedkin, Francis Ford Coppola, and Martin Scorsese. Yet this resurgence could not have occurred without a deeply rooted tradition of local film production.

Richard Koszarski chronicles the compelling and often surprising origins of New York’s postwar film renaissance, looking beyond such classics as Naked City , Kiss of Death , and Portrait of Jennie . He examines the social, cultural, and economic forces that shaped New York filmmaking, from city politics to union regulations, and shows how decades of low-budget independent production taught local filmmakers how to capture the city’s grit, liveliness, and allure. He reveals the importance of “race films”―all-Black productions intended for segregated African American audiences―that not only helped keep the film business afloat but also nurtured a core group of writers, directors, designers, and technicians. Detailed production histories of On the Waterfront and Killer’s Kiss ―films that appear here in a completely new light―illustrate the distinctive characteristics of New York cinema.

Drawing on a vast array of research―including studio libraries, censorship records, union archives, and interviews with participants― “Keep ’Em in the East” rewrites a crucial chapter in the history of American cinema.

Genres: Film

544 pages, Paperback

Published July 13, 2021

Reviews

[Michael Ritchie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I feel like this book was sold as something it's not, or was not intended to be. The first and most interesting part is about the history of shooting films, or parts of films, in New York after Hollywood had become the film capital. The second half focuses almost exclusively on the production of Kazan's On the Waterfront and Kubrick's Killer's Kiss. This half is clearly what interests the author most, and the two halves feel like they belong in different volumes. The research on the two films is deep, but tends to drag the book away from the thesis of the NYC film scene. The book's subtitle makes it clear where the focus is going to be, but I found the detailed examinations of Waterfront and Kiss much less interesting than the earlier, broader history.