East Side Story

Rating: Null/10 (23 December 2002)

This film has just about everything - violence, blood, murder, hookers, sex, drugs, betrayal, revenge, and salvation. The only thing it doesn't have is a strong plot. Still it is worth seeing as a `slice of life' of urban, lower class white society in the mid-nineteenth century.
Set against the backdrop of the corruption of Boss Tweed's Tammany Hall and the Civil War, it depicts the social struggle of native born English-Americans against Irish immigrants. Forget Leo! Daniel Day-Lewis, who plays the bad guy, steals this whole movie and is a shoe-in for a Best Actor nomination.
The thing I loved about this film - and any American history buff will - is that it brings attention to an event that "the authorities" have kept in the closet , The New York Draft Riots (June, 1863)!
After the costly victory at Gettysburg, the Union needed fresh cannon fodder and established its first draft lottery. However, you could legally buy your way out of it for $300 - much to the chagrin of poor whites. This single fact p***ed them off worse than the draft did and for almost a week, over 100,000 demonstrators rioted . Forget about Southern lynching. More blacks were probably hung from light poles in New York than were oak trees in Alabama. The police and army responded with equal violence. President Lincoln was so horrified by the reports, he ordered that no official death toll be kept.
Interesting to note that 100 years later, the govt. still hadn't learned their lesson when another unpopular war resulted in a draft where deferment could be obtained even easier - just by enrolling in college!
BTW, even the Twin Towers get a cameo in this film.