The Big Picture

• Francis Ford Coppola's Rumble Fish marked a shift towards personal, intimate filmmaking after his earlier spectacles.
• The film used avant-garde techniques, black-and-white photography, and a youthful ensemble.
• Rumble Fish kickstarted a period of creative innovation for Coppola, leading to a diverse range of films.

The 1970s were among the most consequential decades in cinematic history, as it saw the younger generation of “New Hollywood” filmmakers growing in prominence. The old guard of studio filmmaking was set aside as a group of bold, highly experimental directors who helmed many films that are still considered classics today. While directors like Martin Scorsese, Brian De Palma, George Lucas, and Steven Spielberg are associated with this movement, no filmmaker was more successful in the 1970s than Francis Ford Coppola. The successful release of The Godfather, The Conversation, The Godfather: Part II, and Apocalypse Now solidified Coppola’s status as one of the most ambitious living filmmakers.

Directing four of the greatest films of all time in rapid succession gave Coppola unlimited resources to draw from, as cinephiles everywhere were waiting with bated breath to see what masterpiece he would unearth next. However, the grueling production of Apocalypse Now and the subsequent box office failure of his ambitious musical One From The Heart forced Coppola to think a little smaller when it came to crafting his next project. While his earlier work had been noted for its spectacle, Coppola’s intimate coming-of-age drama Rumble Fish was a personal project that kicked off an experimental period within his career.

‘Rumble Fish’ Was a Return to Francis Ford Coppola’s Roots

While working on The Godfather certainly earned him an association with major studio productions, Coppola’s early career was highlighted by far more experimental works. While they aren’t always ranked among his best work, Coppola’s 1968 musical Finian’s Rainbow and his 1969 road movie The Rain People both offer kaleidoscopic, observational portrayals of American life that didn’t conform to standard narrative structures. While working with more elaborate budgets and famous movie stars in the 1970s was befitting of the more significant scope of those projects, Coppola’s early work suggested a sparsity of resources would allow him to innovate.

Compared to the elaborate ensemble of The Godfather or the huge scale of Apocalypse Now, Rumble Fish is a stripped-down character drama about the anxieties of reaching adulthood. Loosely based on the novel of the same name by S. E. Hinton, the film centered on the young man Rusty James (Matt Dillon) as he tries to live up to the reputation of his older brother (Mickey Rourke), who is known only as “The Motorcycle Boy.” After working with established actors like Brando and Pacino on The Godfather films, Rumble Fish allowed him to once again draw from a pool of young talent, with Dillon and Rourke both receiving their breakout roles in the film. Additionally, Coppola cast his nephew Nicolas Cage in the role of Rusty’s romantic rival Smokey, and his daughter Sofia Coppola also has a cameo in the film.

While it is certainly a straightforward coming-of-age drama dwindled in budget because of his work in the 1970s, Rumble Fish is among the most ambitious projects of Coppola’s career. Coppola utilized a highly avant-garde style of filmmaking that blurs the line between what is in Rusty’s head and what’s actually happening. Thematically, it ties in perfectly with the film’s themes about self-mythologization and the pressures of masculinity. The use of black and white photography allowed Rumble Fish to feel closer in style to the noir films of the 1940s; however, there was a freewheeling, observational quality to the character interactions that evoked comparison to the work of Jean Luc-Godard and the films of the French New Wave. It felt as if Coppola was pooling all of his influences to make a film representative of what he loved about cinema.

‘Rumble Fish’ Kicked off a Period of Creative Ingenuity for Coppola

While it did receive the widespread accolade and significant cultural impact that his prior films had, the creative success of Rumble Fish signified Coppola’s shift towards making more personal films. The same year, he released another S.E. Hinton adaptation with The Outsiders. Stylistically, The Outsiders was far less bold than Rumble Fish, as it attempted to embody the tone of 1950s melodramas like East of Eden and Rebel Without A Cause. Nonetheless, it was another instance in which Coppola was able to highlight a youthful ensemble; young stars like Emilio Estevez, Tom Cruise, Patrick Swayze, Ralph Macchio, and Rob Lowe all received their breakout roles in The Outsiders.

The spiritual ambiguity of Rumble Fish would be something he’d only occasionally return to, but Coppola opened himself up to working within different genres in the next two decades. While he still made old-fashioned historical epics like the Jazz film The Cotton Club and the biopic Tucker: The Man and His Dream, he also made his first romantic comedy with Peggy Sue Got Married and an elaborate horror film with Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Rumble Fish signified that there was no one overarching genre that tied all of Coppola’s work together; it was his versatility that made him so impressive.

Coppola Continues To Make Experimental Films

A series of critical failures may have brought his career to a standstill in the early 21st century, but Coppola reached newfound success by returning to the style of Rumble Fish. In many ways, his 2009 arthouse drama Tetro felt like a spiritual sequel to Rumble Fish. It was another black-and-white drama with strong noir and French New Wave themes that focused on the relationship between two brothers. He also managed to identify another young star in Alden Ehrenreich, who would cite Coppola’s influence as hugely consequential within his career.

Coppola is on the precipice of yet another comeback, as his highly ambitious science fiction passion project Megalopolis is set to premiere at the Cannes Film Festival. Narratively and stylistically, Megalopolis seems about as far removed from Rumble Fish as possible. Nonetheless, Rumble Fish was certainly the film that signified to Coppola that he wouldn’t have to remain in the shadow of his own success for the rest of his career.

Rumble Fish is available to rent on Amazon in the U.S.

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