rumble fish (1983)
s.e. hinton’s novel rumble fish was tailor-made to be filmed by francis ford coppola. the story of a boy living in the shadow of his great hero, his own older brother, had all the elements that coppola loves to tinker the most: family ties and the search of lost time. fourteen year-old russell-james — or rusty-james to friends, but never just rusty, it made he feel naked — was a boy not-so-bright looking for trouble. he was raised by downtown gangs that no longer existed save for the presence of an old leader — the mysterious and disenchanted motorcycle boy — rusty-james’s 20 year-old brother.
but fate intervened and made coppola read the outsiders first, s.e. hinton’s most famous novel. the plot and characters of the two novels are very similar and it is no surprise that coppola found in it an interesting potential film. but the time metaphors were not so obvious as in rumble fish, and it must have been a real disillusionment to the oscar-winning director when he found out about the shorter, more concise novel. that’s why he shot them both back to back, and it makes you wonder if the first film suffered because of it.
rumble fish is the quintessential coppola film from the 80’s: it was shot fast and cheap, it had some very experimental touches, like the percussion-and-clock-based soundtrack by the police’s stewart copeland, and, unfortunately, it made no money at all. coppola refers to the film to this day as ‘an art film for teenagers’, but it is perhaps more easily appreciated not by the rusty-jameses of yesterday and today, but by its motorcycle boys.
