Talk:The Untouchables (film)

Synopsis

The film's synopsis originally carried a parenthetical note about the difference between Nitti's ulitmate fate and his fate in the movie. I removed it because having that note in alone leaves the impression that the article is saying that rest of the movie is essentially historically accurate, which is far from the truth. Capone, Nitti and Ness were real people, of course, but there is almost nothing depicted in the specific events of the movie that actually happened.

Rather than pick out that one thing to provide a side note about, perhaps a full "reality vs. the movie" section of the article would be in order. Mwelch 22:49, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

" Ness solicits help from Jim Malone (Sean Connery), an incorruptible Irish American police officer from Scotland" needs to be edited for clarity 64.147.222.161 (talk) 09:26, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

2007 continuation

I don't mean to sound critical of the author, but the article's synopsis is more like a report of the sequence of events as portrayed in the movie. To avoid spoiling a book or movie the point is to be as brief but informative of the general subject matter as possible. Anynobody 12:12, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree. I guess I will write up a new plot of the film with fewer than 900 words, as according to the MOS of WikiProject Films.--Kylohk 10:51, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

It is done now, the synopsis has no more than 650 words. A lot of excessive stuff has been removed.--Kylohk 11:58, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Potemkin links

I wasn't sure if this would qualify as a minor edit, so I thought I'd point it out. The links in the Trivia section referring to the film "The Battleship Potemkin" led to the article on the actual battleship. I have changed the links to direct to the film's article, as I assume they were meant to. Rex Dart 00:13, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:UntouchablesThe.jpg

Image:UntouchablesThe.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot 11:31, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

2007???

According to the text: Antoine Fuqua was originally attached to direct in 2004,[2] but DePalma took over the reins a year later.[3] Shooting was set to begin in June 2007,[4] but was delayed to October. Gerard Butler signed on to star in May 2007,[5] and Nicolas Cage was negotiated with to play Al Capone, but left due to scheduling difficulties.[6] In a November 2007 interview, De Palma said that if he could not cast the lead role and begin production within the next month that he may move on to other projects; De Palma stated that he needed to be shooting during the winter to recreate the St. Valentine's Day Massacre.[7]

I think you meant 1984 and 1987?

````````` —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.81.139.182 (talk) 14:36, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

No, he didn't mean 1984 and 1987. The text above refers to the supposed upcoming prequel to this movie.ArcAngel (talk) 17:42, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:The untouchables group.jpg

Image:The untouchables group.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. BetacommandBot (talk) 02:35, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Link to Quotations from the film via WikiQuote

Due to it being a dramatization, the writers no doubt took some liberties with actual quotes. I'm going to add the link under synopsis unless anyone objects. Hutch1970 (talk) 17:35, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Found correct way to link to WikiQuote - added. Hutch1970 (talk) 17:56, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Differences between fact and fiction

I moved this section here as it is in list form and lacks any citings. Once it has been converted to prose and sourced properly then it can be put back into the article.--J.D. (talk) 17:52, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

• In the film, there are only four "Untouchables": Ness, Jim Malone, Oscar Wallace, and George Stone. However, according to Ness's biography, there were actually ten of them, including himself. However, Malone, Wallace and Stone may have been based on real-life models. Malone's real-life counterpart may have been Martin Lahart, an Irish-American from a family of cops who served as Ness's second-in-command. However, Ness and Lahart were both in their 20's at the time of the Capone investigation, and Lahart was born in the U.S., not Scotland. According to Charles Martin Smith in the Special Collector's Edition DVD feature The Script, The Cast, Wallace, the bespectacled agent with the accounting background, was loosely modeled on Frank Wilson, the Treasury Agent who commanded the team of IRS investigators who put together the tax evasion case against Capone.

Eliot Ness

• While Ness and his real Untouchables did battle with Capone's organization, they had little to do with assembling the tax evasion case that would ultimately send Capone to prison. That case was put together by the criminal investigations unit of the Internal Revenue Service separately from Ness's efforts, though some of the evidence used to assemble that case included financial records seized by Ness during raids. Similarly the IRS unit would pass information on to Ness's squad about the location of breweries, stills, etc.

• Ness's main strategy in his war with the Capone mob was raiding breweries. Breweries represented a major investment of capital and putting one out of commission simultaneously constituted an immediate major loss of assets due to the confiscation of the equipment, and a future major loss of income due to the crippling effect the raids had on the Mob's ability to provide a saleable product. In the film, Ness and his squad make one raid on a liquor warehouse, and intercept an international shipment of liquor coming across the Canadian border, but do not raid a single brewery.

• The scene in which Ness confronts Capone in the hotel lobby and demands a fight with Capone is entirely fictional. In reality, Ness and Capone never met face to face before Capone's tax evasion trial.

• Two of the four Untouchables are killed in the movie. In real life, none of the actual Untouchables were killed, though some were injured during their battles against the mob. Frank Basile, an associate of Ness's prior to the formation of the squad, was killed, but he was not officially an agent. Of note, the two Untouchables who are killed drink or prepare to drink alcohol at some point in the film.

• During the trial scene, Nitti is shown to have bribed the jury of Capone's trial into acquitting Capone of all charges. The judge then substitutes another jury for the tainted one. (This makes little sense, as, in the film, the trial is well underway at the time of the jury-switch, meaning the new jury would be asked to decide a trial in which they'd missed the bulk of the evidence and testimony.) In reality, Nitti was ruling Capone's crumbling empire, while enforcers attempted to tamper with the pool of potential jurors that had been assembled before the trial began. The judge then replaced the pool of potential jurors with another pool that had been assembled for a different trial. Jury tampering during a trial already in progress would most likely result in a mistrial. Furthermore, in the movie, the judge switches his jury with the one in the next courtroom, which is described as a divorce trial - but being a federal courthouse divorce cases would not be heard there.

• The judge in the trial is depicted as a grafter, who switches juries only after being threatened with public exposure of his corruption. In fact, the judge in the Capone trial, James Wilkerson, had a well-deserved reputation for probity and integrity, and the idea for switching the jury pools prior to the beginning of the trial was entirely his.

• In the film, Capone's lawyer pleads his client guilty over his client's vehement protests. In real life, Capone pled not guilty, and the trial went to verdict. A defense lawyer in a criminal trial would not be allowed to plead guilty on behalf of his client without the client's consent.

• The final confrontation between Ness and Nitti, in which the latter falls to his death, is entirely fiction. In fact, Nitti spent nearly six years running the empire after the fall of Capone, and he committed suicide in March 1943 upon learning of his possible jail sentence. The Capone minion who was discovered carrying a gun in court, and who was later found to have a list of the jury pool in his pocket, was Phil D'Andrea, not Nitti, and he did not have permission from the Mayor of Chicago. His being discovered with a concealed weapon led to a quiet arrest and not a rooftop shootout.

• In a similar vein, while Nitti was depicted as Capone's chief hitman in the film, in reality he was, by this point at least, in charge of the gang's financial dealings; Jack McGurn or Fred Burke would have been more accurately depicted in this role.

• In the film, Ness and his squad are referred to as "Treasury Agents." In fact, at the time of the Capone investigation, the Bureau of Prohibition, the agency Ness worked for, was part of the Department of Justice, and had been since 1930.

• In the film, Ness is depicted as a family man with a wife, a daughter, and a son on the way. In real life, the thrice-married Ness was a bachelor during most of the Capone investigation. He had only one child, a son he adopted with his third wife, long after his law enforcement career had ended. In fact, the point of calling his team "untouchables" was that none of his men had any immediate family who could be threatened by the mob.

Most of the material above is accurate, through it does lack citations. Capone and his "Outfit" usually imported alcohol from Canada rather than trying to manufacture booze themselves in Chicago. Brewing alcohol that is safe to drink requires much expensive equipment that could easily be seized by the Bureau of Prohibition as pointed out above. By contrast, if a shipment of booze from Canada was seized that was all that was lost. The evidence gathered by the IRS led to Capone's conviction for tax evasion in 1931, an effort in which Ness and his team of "Untouchables" were only marginally involved in. Ness as a agent of the Bureau of Prohibition had assembled that Capone was involved in bootlegging, but the time the case was ready to go to court in 1933, Prohibition had ended, so the charges were dropped. Capone had already convicted of tax evasion two years earlier so from the viewpoint of the government convicting Capone for bootlegging was pointless. All this effort on the part of Ness led nowhere, and the popular claim that Ness was the man who brought down "Scarface Al" has no basis in reality. Notably, Ness later served as the Public Security Director in Cleveland, Ohio, where he tried very hard to catch a serial killer known as the "Mad Butcher" and failed.  

It was not until the 1950s when Ness hired a sports journalist Oscar Fraley to ghost-write his memoirs, which became a bestseller after it was published in 1957 that made Ness into an iconic figure in American culture. To put mildly, Fraley took quite a few liberties with the truth and much of the book is fiction. In The Untouchables, Fraley had Ness's third wife, Bess, being his girlfriend at the time he was chasing after Capone. In reality, Ness didn't meet his third wife until years later. Likewise, Ness is described by those who knew him as afraid of guns and as a man who rarely his office. The image of Ness leading raids and shooting it out with gangsters is all fiction. There were no shoot-outs as most gangsters want to get to rich, not to get killed. The sort of discipline that exists in military organisations where an officer can order his men into battle, through common sense would suggest the risk of death or injury should rule out going into battle, does not exist with organised crime. Anyhow, unlike in Italy, Mafiosi in America do not kill policemen-the risk of retaliation from the U.S. government are too great. Italy by contrast has a weak state, and if the Mafia assassinate policemen, the Italian state is too weak to retaliate.  

The same could be said about this film. The climatic shoot-out in the train station with the baby's carriage rolling down the steps is based on the famous "Odessa Steps" scene from the 1925 Soviet film Battleship Potemkin. The "Odessa Steps" is a dramatized version of a real incident that occurred in 1905 in the steps leading to the seafront in Odessa. Battleship Potemkin dealing with the 1905 mutiny abroad the Potemkin, the battleship that served as the flagship of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, is Communist propaganda, but a number of the scenes in that film are based in real incidents. The famous scene when the sailors abroad the Potemkin are ordered to shoot several of their colleagues who complained about being served rotten food, and instead turn their guns on the officers is true to life. At present, the article does not mention how film copied the "Odessa Steps", which might be useful.--A.S. Brown (talk) 02:10, 1 March 2020 (UTC)  

Actually Eliot Ness was married to Edna Stahle (1900–1938) from 1929 to 1938 so before and after the Untouchables.

Production

This sentence is difficult to make sense of: "According to Brian De Palma, Robert De Niro and Bob Hoskins were the prime candidates for the role of Al Capone, and Hoskins, for his brief collaboration after De Niro declined but before he changes his mind, was sent a $500.000 cheque by De Palma"

Can someone who knows what it is trying to say please clean it up? It needs to be split into separate sentences or better punctuated. Also, is the cheque five hundred dollars or five hundred thousand dollars? The use of a point suggests the former, but quoting three decimals suggests the latter. Which is it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.154.151.203 (talk) 22:05, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Advice

I noticed that someone wanted to write a better plot. I would like suggest to that person to delete the current one and write the new one in the same edit - otherwise, the page goes some time almost devoid of a plot, which, I'm pretty sure, is what many visitors to the page intend to read. At least if you delete and re-write the plot in the same edit, we can still read the current one until yours is in place. Grieferhate (talk) 22:27, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Headlines

• CAPONE'S CHICAGO STIRS AGAIN FOR THE UNTOUCHABLES
• At the Movies - May 29, 1987
• BOTTLED IN BOND, HE'S VINTAGE CONNERY

to use with this article--J.D. (talk) 14:40, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

"The Scottish question"

Àn IP hopping sock keeps adding in the "fact" that Malone is Scottish, which is incorrect, he was Irish-American, just happened to be played by a Scottish actor mentioned in the article. Now if the IP wants to add Scottish I suggest in the process of WP:RS and WP:BRD. Murry1975 (talk) 16:18, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Added back in without reference. Murry1975 (talk) 17:06, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

As you said, the character is clearly not Scottish. The IP is just a troll who should be reverted on sight. ---RepublicanJacobite<sub>TheFortyFive</sub> 18:05, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

It would be like saying Brendan Gleeson's character in Troy was Greek-Irish!!. "Menelaus, come in, its time for yer tae!!" Murry1975 (talk) 18:12, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

jimmy malone is scottish hes a fictional character and david mamet say he was from scotland in his script notes and :RepublicanJacobite is clearly a troll and racist some people are scots irish woody ty.

Show evidence then, and btw on RepublicanJacobite talkpage you state its the fact that Connery is Scottish (Don't send a message to me idiot you are a trouble maker and sean connery is from scotland), so you are contradicting yourself.Murry1975 (talk) 21:09, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Also dont call anyone racist.Please read WP:NPA Murry1975 (talk) 21:11, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

The facts:

"The incorruptible Irish-American officer plays a key role in crime-buster Elliot Ness's efforts to lock up Robert De Niro's mobster Al Capone" from The Daily Record

"The Edinburgh-born actor has often been criticized for failing to lose his famous Scottish brogue when playing non-Scots, like Irish cop Malone in “Untouchables” and Russian Captain Marko Ramius in “The Hunt for Red October.” From Irishcentral.com

"But he enlists veteran Irish cop Jimmy Malone (the Scottish-accented Sean Connery)" from Washington Post

"As incorruptible "Irish" beat cop Jim Malone in 1987's "The Untouchables," the former James Bond mixed up his natural Scottish burr with an Irish brogue and left audiences generally confused as to what his character was doing in gangland Chicago in the first place" from Xfinity

"Malone is the quintessential 1920s Irish-American flatfoot, with one difference, he has a thick Scottish accent!" from Movie Deaths.

Irish American, if you find a source stating Scotland or Scottish in terms of the character go ahead and put it in. If not stop adding. Murry1975 (talk) 21:27, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Sean Connery played jimmy malone with a thick Scottish accent on purpose to show he was scots Irish,In james bond he played it with a british voice hes no idiot.Sean connery in the Daily Record co.uk in september 6 2008 by ian dow say he based the character on sergeant George gray a Fountainbridge scottish policemen and George Gray is very proud of this fact so i think since they call him irish in the film hes a scots irish american.Woody ty 10 April 2012 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Woody ty (talk • contribs) 21:39, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

If you post it here and my talkpage it really takes up too much wiki-space. I will save myself fromm typing by just c&p

Well done he based his reading of the character on a person he knew. This does not make that character Scottish. He is not Scottish-Irish-American, and you have not shown a source for this claim " with a thick Scottish accent on purpose ". Now please read the welcome meesage on your page and the other links I have posted on the IPs used by and on the talkpage.

ANd then you say "they call him irish in the film ", yes thats what the character is. Murry1975 (talk) 21:45, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

14:24, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Malone is an Irish/Irish name. It has no association with Scotland or Ulster Scots. Let's just say that Connery was never good with accents, and leave it at that. One thing is for certain: no Irish cop named Malone would have sounded the way Connery does in the film. The accent is 100% wrong. Hanoi Road (talk) 22:26, 12 December 2020 (UTC)

Cast

I suggest that the cast table be removed as unnecessary and inaccurate. The characters and events in the movie have been so fictionalized and dramatized they have little resemblance to the historical people. The only characters who even have the same names are Ness and Capone, some of the others are composites, or essentially created out of whole cloth. So, as I said, the table is unnecessary and inaccurate. ---RepublicanJacobite<sub>TheFortyFive</sub> 17:55, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Time period

This article is currently in the categories Films set in the 1920s and Films set in the 1930s, but the article itself never says when it is set. As the film telescopes events drastically and largely fictionalizes said events, it is hard to say what year this is with any certainty. My guess, though, would be that this is set around 1930-31, and the events dramatized happen in a short amount of time. My point being, it does not belong in both categories. Anyone have any thoughts on this? ---The Old Jacobite<sub>The '45</sub> 17:15, 5 March 2013 (UTC)