Hollywood is one of the most inherently capitalist institutions in America and, as such, inherently hostile towards the labour movement, especially when it manifests itself in the form of a union. This might explain why there are so few Hollywood films about unions, and those that do exist almost always tend to deal with their negative aspects like corruption or connections with organised crime. This also explains why Jimmy Hoffa, a flamboyant and controversial union leader, has directly and indirectly inspired such a number of Hollywood films. The first of them, made a few years after his mysterious disappearance, is F.I.S.T., a 1978 epic crime drama directed by Norman Jewison.
The protagonist of the film, played by Sylvester Stallone (who also co-wrote the script), is Hoffa’s fictitious alter ego by the name of Johnny Kovak. The plot begins in 1937 Cleveland, in the time of the Great Depression, when jobs were scarce and capitalists abused this in order to brutally exploit the workers. One of the workers less willing to accept the injustice is Johnny, and he, with the help of his good friend Abe Belkin (played by David Huffman), organises a protest action against the employers. This action, despite being unsuccessful, brings the attention of Mike Monahan (played by Richard Hed), an activist who recruits him into the union called the Federation of Inter State Truckers (F.I.S.T.). They start a strike against a trucking company, which becomes increasingly violent. After Mike is killed by company goons, Johnny decides to accept the offer of assistance from gangster Vince Doyle (played by Kevin Conway). With extra “muscle”, the strikers start a campaign of sabotage, and the striking truckers force the company to capitulate. This spectacular victory helps Johnny gradually rise in the ranks of the union. Two decades later, F.I.S.T. is a powerful national organisation, and Johnny becomes its president, but he appears unable to face the consequences of its pact with the criminals. While the idealistic Belkin wants to sever ties, Kovak becomes the target of crime-crusading Senator Madison (played by Rod Steiger).
F.I.S.T. was one of the more ambitious films of its time. For Stallone, then at the start of his stardom, the role of Kovak was an opportunity to transcend his iconic Rocky image and prove that he could play more complex characters in more serious films. Jewison used this film as an opportunity to compete with the thematically and stylistically similar The Godfather and show the dark, criminal underbelly of the American Dream. Both of them failed, which shouldn’t be surprising. Stallone, despite his charisma, lacks the acting skills of Al Pacino, so the second half of the film, in which his character seems torn between idealism, loyalty to friends and pragmatic calculation, looks underwhelming. Jewison, on the other hand, lacks Coppola’s flair for subtle melodrama, so the ending, despite being abrupt and more shockingly brutal than the alleged fate of Hoffa in real life, looks uncathartic and deeply unsatisfying to the audience, especially when compared with the emotionally more involving and spectacular scenes of street battles in the beginning.
RATING: 5/10 (++)
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