new york in films
With its still-dashing skyline and its rugged
facades, its mean streets and its swanky avenues New
York is probably the most filmed city on earth, or
at least the one most instantly recognizable from
the movies. It would be fruitless to enumerate them
all; we've just given a small sampling below of
films that best capture the city's atmosphere, its
pulse and its style and, if nothing else, gives you a
pretty good idea of what you're going to get before
you get there.
Thirteen great New York movies
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Breakfast at Tiffany's
(Blake Edwards, 1961). This most charming
and cherished of New York movie romances
stars Audrey Hepburn as party girl Holly
Golightly flitting through the glittering
playground of the Upper East Side.
Hepburn
and George Peppard run up and down each
other's fire-escapes and skip down Fifth
Avenue taking in the New York Public Library
and that jewelry store. |
Annie Hall (Woody Allen, 1977).
Oscar-winning autobiographical comic romance, which
flits from reminiscences of Alvy Singer's childhood
living beneath the Coney Island rollercoaster, to
life and love in uptown Manhattan, is a valentine
both to then-lover and co-star Diane Keaton if not
to the city. Simultaneously clever, bourgeois and
very winning. All of Allen's movies are New
York-centric; also don't miss Manhattan
(1979), which with its Gershwin soundtrack and
stunning black-and-white photography is probably the
greatest eulogy to the city ever made.
Do the Right Thing (Spike Lee, 1989). Set
over 24 hours on the hottest day of the year in
Brooklyn's Bed-Stuyvesant section - a day on which
the melting pot is reaching boiling point - Spike
Lee's colorful, stylish film moves from comedy to
tragedy to compose an epic tale of New York.
The French Connection
(William Friedkin,
1971). Plenty of heady Brooklyn atmosphere in this
sensational Oscar-winning cop thriller starring Gene
Hackman, whose classic car-and-subway chase takes
place under the Bensonhurst Elevated Railroad.
The Godfather Part II
(Francis Ford
Coppola, 1974). Flashing back to the early life of
Vito Corleone, Coppola's great sequel re-created the
Italian immigrant experience at the turn of the
century, portraying Corleone quarantined at Ellis
Island and growing up tough on the meticulously
re-created streets of Little Italy.
Midnight Cowboy (John Schlesinger, 1969)
The odd love story between Jon Voight's bumpkin
hustler and Dustin Hoffman's touching urban creep
Ratso Rizzo plays out against both the seediest and
swankiest of New York locations.
On the Town (Gene Kelly, Stanley Donen,
1949). Three sailors get 24-hours' shore leave in
NYC and fight over whether to do the sights or chase
the girls. This exhilarating, landmark musical with
Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra, and Ann Miller flashing
her gams in the American Museum of Natural History
was the first to take the musical out of the studios
and onto the streets.
On the Waterfront
(Elia Kazan, 1954). Few
images of New York are as indelible as Marlon
Brando's rooftop pigeon coop at dawn and those misty
views of New York Harbor (actually shot just over
the river in Hoboken), in this unforgettable story
of long-suffering longshoremen and union
racketeering.
Rosemary's Baby (Roman Polanski, 1968).
Mia Farrow and John Cassavettes move into their
dream New York apartment in the Dakota Building
(72nd and Central Park West) and think their
problems stop with nosy neighbors and thin walls
until Farrow gets pregnant and hell, literally,
breaks loose. Arguably the most terrifying film ever
set in the city.
The Sweet Smell of Success
(Alexander
Mackendrick, 1957). Broadway as a nest of vipers.
Gossip columnist Burt Lancaster and sleazy press
agent Tony Curtis eat each other's tails in this
jazzy, cynical study of showbiz corruption. Shot on
location, and mostly at night, in steely black and
white, Times Square and the Great White Way never
looked so alluring.
 Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976). A
long night's journey into day by the great
chronicler of the dark side of the city - and New
York's greatest filmmaker. Scorsese's New York is
hallucinatorily seductive and thoroughly repellent
in this superbly unsettling study of obsessive
outsider Travis Bickle (Robert De Niro).
West Side Story
(Robert Wise, Jerome
Robbins, 1961). Sex, singing and Shakespeare in a
hyper-cinematic Oscar-winning musical (via Broadway)
about rival street gangs. Lincoln Center now stands
where the Sharks and the Jets once rumbled and
interracial romance ended in tragedy.
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