Comparing Casablanca To The Dark Knight

From Casablanca to The Dark Knight, the majority of global audience has adored melodrama as a genre since the beginning of the golden age of Hollywood. We appreciate these dramas for strong appeal to our emotions. As a result, melodramas are a tremendous tool to evaluate the tides of society’s value. Male melodramas, usually driven by the characters’ masculinity, therefore, are not only useful to assess our preference for an engaging thriller, but also means to determine the sameness in our humanity for the strong emphasize on masculinity as a storytelling device. Gran Torino and The Hustler are two films from the two completely different periods (modernist and classical); however, they carry resemblance similarities for introducing the salvation

stories of two antiheroes in melodramatic settings while depicting characteristics of male masculinity.
Antihero is an archetype of character that can be traced to ancient Greece. It maintained its appeal to the audience throughout the course of history. The dark qualities they possess such as arrogance, violence, and dishonesty usually appeal to ordinary audience romantically as these qualities evoke mixed emotions among audience such as empathy, concern and sometimes disgust. As the antiheroes go through their journeys, struggle against their flaws and achieve salvation, audience would relate to the story and feel content about the their change to the better. In both Gran Torino and The Hustler, fast Eddie and Walt are essentially the same character despite the immense age and background difference. Fast Eddie loses to Minnesota Fats in their first matchup because of his arrogance and inability to control his urge to gamble. When Charlie tries to convince Eddie to quit, Eddie replies “the pool game is over when fats says it’s over” and refuses to stop his game. In Gran Torino, Walt is an old grumpy war veteran that threatens his neighbor by yelling, “get of my lawn” with a gun pointing to their heads. He is also extremely racist for he uses a different racial slur every time he meets his neighbor such as “slopes”, “fish heads”, “swamp rats” and “chink”. All of these imperfections foreshadow the greater change later in the plot, which makes the story more powerful and engaging.
As male melodramas, both films represent the pursuit of masculinity at the time.

What society consider as muscular are depicted in the films as a reflection of the time periods. However, by examining some of the characteristics of both Eddie and Walt, one can easily notice the similarity despite of the 50 years gap between the two of them. For instance, the affection for possessions in The Hustler is shown through every aspect of every male character. Eddie and his partner hustle pool players at local bars for a living. Moreover, when Bert took Eddie to the Kentucky Derby, audience is presented with endless gambling, fancy suites, and men with great power. All of these are still relevant even today, which demonstrates how much the pursuit of masculinity has stayed the same over the years. Meanwhile in Gran Torino, we are aware of equal amount of love for possessions. Even the tile of the film is named after Walt’s beloved car the 1972 Ford Gran Torino. Serving as the Mcguffin of the story, we see different male character lusts over the car. And when Tao drives the Gran Torino off with his girlfriend towards the end of the film, we see the legacy continues on another male

character.
As for the plot structure, the two films are also almost identical for telling the story of aforementioned antiheroes manage not only survive in world, but also manage to find success within the contexts of the films.

In The Hustler, Eddie is first introduced as a genius pool player who is reasonably successful but itches to play with the legends such as the Minnesota Fats. Eddie loses and is deemed without a “character” by Fats’ backer Bert, and embarks on his exile lifestyle. Eventually, after a series of incidents including the loss of his woman, Eddie finds his “character” and defeats Fats. The similar storytelling structure, which a hero fails at the beginning, encounter life-changing experience, and finally redeems himself, is also used in Gran Torino. In Gran Torino, Walt is introduced as an unpleasant old man and is seriously alienated from his family, church member, and most of all, his Asian neighbors. Through his interaction with Tao and his sister, Walt finds not only the Hmong foods delicious, but also his little buddy Tao worth saving from the evil gangster cousins. After his death at the end of the film, Walt becomes a respected man in the community despite all of his unpleasant mannerism at the

beginning.
The evident similarity while depicting masculinity reveals some of the most fundamental characteristics of our humanity. In other words, the reason for the sameness between the two films is the fact that basic humanity stays the same despite the occurrence of all eventualities over time. Some argue that wars are all the same and so is any other historic events. Both films are the product of the events prior to them. Even though different events have occurred between 1960s and 2000s, these events are just the result of similar parts of our humanity. For example, when one force gets in the way of another, there will be war. World War I may be directly the result of the assassination Archduke Franz Ferdinand. It is no different from the Korean War or the Vietnam War: different incidents caused these wars but it is the conflict of interests that made the incidents possible. A number of events regarding the popular culture also had influence on the two periods. From the great depression to the world wars, the Cold War, the Rock and Roll times, and the civil rights movement, even the most recent recession, all of these events can be contributed to some of the basic parts of ourselves. For example, the similar mindset and irresponsibility of bankers caused the Great Depression and the recent recession; similarly, the same urge for equality and freedom lead to the civil rights movement, women’s right movement, and the fight for gay rights. The unchanged fundamentals of our humanity is precisely the reason why male melodramas remain generally unchanged over the span of more than 50 years.
In conclusion, in spite of coming from two vastly different periods, Gran Torino and The Hustler are essentially identical for depicting same male pursuit and employing same storytelling structure. It is fair to say that even though times change, events occur, we as human do not change; therefore, what we see as muscular and what we appreciate in stories do not change.