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Actors: Pat Boone, Erik Estrada
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| Review Summary and Plot Commentary about The Cross and the Switchblade |
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Pastor David Wilkerson (Pat Boone) is sent from a bucolic church in Pennsylvania to the urban mean streets of New York City. He tries to stem the violence between youth gangs killing one another in turf wars by preaching the word of God. The gangs repeatedly get into serious and sometimes deadly fights with knives, chains, and clubs with one another and even the police. Wilkerson works tirelessly to turn the young men and women under his charge away from drugs and violence. Gang leader Israel (DiFilippi) and a warrior of the Mau-Mau's named Nicky Cruz (Estrada) are the toughest and most troublesome of those he encounters.
A young woman named Little Bo Peep (Robinson) helps Wilkerson to learn the rules of the street, the laws of gang loyalty, and the price of betrayal. Wilkerson displays incredible courage and an unshakable faith to enter the desperate and dysfunctional world of criminal gangs and the dangers they present. Mingo, a young gang member is killed in a knife fight between the Bishop's and the Mau-Mau's. Wilkerson helps to straighten out a heroin addict as she goes through cold-turkey withdrawals. The temptation of drugs, gangs, and crime are often too strong to resist for those with nowhere else to turn, but Cruz eventually sees the light and answers a higher calling having taken Wilkerson's message of love and religion to heart.
--David Fletcher, Resident Scholar
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| Analysis of The Cross and the Switchblade |
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Ratings are on a 1-10 scale (Low to High)
Plot
Time/era of movie:
- 1960's-1970's
Crime & Scandal
Yes
Story of
- gang conflict
Job/Profession/Poverty Story?
Yes
Job:
- religious figure
Main Character
Identity:
- Male
Profession/status:
- religious figure
Age:
- 20's-30's
Eccentric:
Yes
- obsessed
Is this an ordinary person caught up in events?
Yes
Hair color?
- brunette (Brown)
Hair type
- (man) short/standard straight
Body type
- (man) average
Events of movie makes character more...
- caring
Ethnicity/Nationality
- White (American)
How sensitive is this character?
- sensitive to others' feelings
Intelligence
- Smarter than most other characters
Physique
- average physique
Secondary Main Character
Ethnicity/Nationality
- White (American)
Main Adversary
Identity:
- gang
How much of work is main antagonist actually present in:
- 90%-100%
Ethnicity/Nationality
- Hispanic/Latinic
How sensitive is this character?
- mean, arrogant
Setting
United States
Yes
The US:
- Northeast
City?
Yes
City:
- New York
- dirty, grimy (like New York)
- dangerous
Misc setting
- sewers/subways
Style
Accounts of torture and death?
- explicit references to deaths
Movie makes you feel...
- spiritual
Sex/nudity in movie?
Yes
What kind of sex:
- vague references only
- kissing
Any profanity?
- Some foul language
If soundtrack VERY NOTICEABLE...
- Rap/hip-hop
Is this movie based on a
- book
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Note: the views expressed here are only those of the reviewer(s). | |
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