Public Enemy Number 1
The 1931 film, The Public Enemy, provided James Cagney with an astute vehicle by which to claim stardom and notoriety, both as an actor and an alternative sex symbol. Wielding a sub machine gun, smoking a cigar and wearing a Zoot suit, the film still was reproduced as a print by Andy Warhol in 1962, simply entitled Cagney.
All the qualities of a gangster culture seemed to have found their place symbolically and symbiotically in an underground stream of economy. A mixture of testosterone, gun power, neat dress, high lifestyle, violent caricatures and devilish luck with the opposite sex - indeed a series of qualities that seem to be still recognisably gangster whether describing James Cagney in 1931 or Snoop Dogg in 1993 or Shah Rukh Khan in 2006.
All men, all hard, all guns ablaze at moving targets beyond the frame - the gangster cult has been part of the visual culture for a long time - a partner in crimes of passion, a remarkable co-existence between depiction and reality. The music and film world have portrayed gangster culture with all its alternative status as a fertile ground for storytelling, often from meager beginnings to highly emotional endings on bridges and dark alleyways, whilst the songs of Johnny Cash and, more recently gangsta culture, a part of rap music, have given us emotive, if not entertaining, renderings of life on the streets and the worthiness of the game.
Hardly an era has passed when entertainers, movie makers, songwriters and even artists have not turned to this most awkward, yet destructive, force in our society. It remains a bane of poor businesses, a tragedy for risky ventures and part of the rich mix of immigrant life that is so initially dependent of illegal trade.
The goods frequently traded range from degrading human virtues including prostitution and the trafficking of young women to drugs, arms, piracy, gambling and laundering money - often the very backgrounds from which narratives for gangster lifestyles and personalities are portrayed.
