Cole Greenberg

Blue Group

Cinematic Analysis Part A

The Theme of The 1992 movie Newsies about the newspaper boy strikes of 1899 is that through unity groups of
people become stronger and gain more courage. The movie follows Jack Kelly a rambunctious Newspaper boy who his
fellow workers call Cowboy and who lives with the other orphan newsboys. The movie begins with the boys waking up
and the capturing the chaotic scene of hardened orphans getting ready for the day. The boys walk to the paper distribution
center in a large group led by Jack after grabbing breakfast from a couple of kind nuns. There at the center Jack meets
David Jacobs and his small brother Les a boy who has recently left school to support his family due to an accident which
left his father unable to work. David quickly learns the Jack sells papers very efficiently but at the same time twists the
headlines and manipulates people into buying the paper. Jack runs into an enemy of his named Snyder who ran the old
refuge that Jack escaped from. All three of the boys escape from Snyder by out running him, and after hiding out in an
entertainment hall from Snyder David invites Jack to have dinner at his house. There he meets Davids sister who he
thinks is pretty and is immediately interested in. When Jack leaves the Jacobs household he confesses to the audience that
he secretly dreams to escape from New York and head to Santa Fe. Jacks boss Joseph Pulitzer in an effort to beat his
competition, he raises the price Newsies pay for newspapers. Infuriated by this Jack and David decide to organize a strike
among the Newsies to convince Pulitzer to lower the price. The Newsies under the command of Jack spread across the city
in an attempt to convince other sections of Newsies to participate in the Strike. At the same time a reporter named Bryan
Denton takes interest in the Newsies strike and after taking the Newsies to lunch asks them to keep him updated on the
strike. The Newsies storm the distribution center and destroy all of the papers and scram when the cops arrive. The next
day the Newsies go to stop the boys who replaced them at their job from collecting papers and when the strike turns
violent the police arrive again, and just as the Newsies are about to lose the Brooklyn section of Newsies saves them. The
police barge into an unsuccessful rally and take Jack and all his Newsies hostage. Pulitzer personally offers Jack a deal
where all charges will be dropped if Jack works as a replacement worker or a Scab. Jacks Newsies are discouraged
without their leader and call him a traitor after he becomes a Scab. Jack quickly begins helping David and Les and their
sister anyways and the four of them plus Denton Secretly use Pulitzers Printing press to create a newspaper insulting him
and spread it across New York. Pulitzer seeing hes been beaten gives into their demands after Jack and David personally
confront him. Jack learns that Teddy Roosevelt himself has gotten word of the strike and supported him. The Newsies
appeared to hold more power as a united group instead of separated and are able to prevail as a movement.

Part B
The movie is based on the historical landmark of the Newspaper boy strikes of 1899 and portrays many
historical facts and relevance. The Newspapers of Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst were the two papers
involved in the strike as they were the two main papers that refused to lower the price news boys paid for papers
when other papers did. Although the movie only centers on the paper of Pulitzer the New York World Hearst is
mentioned as a large competitor of Pulitzer. The movie didnt seem to capture the harsh lives the Newsies lived and
instead focused on the happier aspects of their lives and portrayed them as tough city kids instead of soft orphans
living in awful conditions. Life was very difficult for these boys, they would work over 10 hours a day, often risk
their lives, and then go home to poor conditions and little food ( The News Boys Strike ,http://ows.edb.utexas.edu).
Many of the Strikes were led by courageous figures like Jack Kelly who united the Newsies with their leadership.
An interesting thing to note is that a very historical leader of the Newsies was named Kid Blink just like a
character in the movie although the movie character was just a news boy under the command of Jack and certainly
not a leader. The strikes were highly publicized by the other newspapers since any bad publicity against Pulitzer and
Hearst was good news for them. In the movie no other papers treated the rallies as worthy news and choose not to
publicize the rallies. Pulitzer and Hearst actually choose to buy back unsold papers instead of dropping the price of
papers which in the end created a bigger profit for the Newsies anyways. The movie captures the chaos of the labor
movements and the violence between the Newsies and Scabs and the frequency of the brawls. A couple of Newsies
sold out to the Newspapers and became Scabs working in the replacement of their former Newsies. But these kids
were considered traitors to the Newsies and were in danger of getting beaten by the rough New York Newsies. It is
a well-known fact that Jack Kelly turned scab for two days in Disney's version. He quickly rejoined the ranks of his
Newsie friends just as David, and maybe Blink, did back in 1899. (Similarities and Differences between Disney's
Newsboy Strike and the Actual Strike of 1899,angelfire.com). Blink refers to the actual leader of the Newsies in
1899 along with a kid named Boots. It is historically unclear if kid Blink actually returned to the Newsies like
Jack Kelly. Kid Blink shows up in the movie as a minor supporting character but has no bigger role. The Movie
represents a very important part of the labor movements and although there are some differences between Disneys
version and History the story captured many details and relevant historical facts.

Part C
1.

Analyze the use of metaphor and imagery in the film, citing several examples.
In the movie Newsies the main character wishes to move to Santa Fe and start a new life under the

impression that Santa Fe holds all kind of wonders. Santa Fe represents an escape for Jack from all of his
troubles and a new start. Jack wishes to be free of his own will without anyone telling him what to do. At
the same time Jack also longs for a family even though he tries to convince himself he doesnt need one. In
the end of the movie he decides to stay in New York with his Newsies who have symbolically become his
family instead of leaving to Santa Fe. In his song Santa Fe he sings So that's what they call a family
Aint ya glad you aint that way, with a saddened and wistful tone. The dreaded refuge that Jack escaped
from is always surrounded by dark lighting and the hopeless expressions of the kids there. The director did
this so that the audience would associate the refuge with hopelessness and dark emotions. When Jack visits
the refuge to rescue his friend Crutchy, the audience glimpses these things for a few minutes. The owner
and warden of the refuge named Snyder represents Jacks dark past which he must first escape before he can
fulfill his wish to move to Santa Fe. But his dark past keeps catching up to him although he managed to
elude it many times. Jacks clever well-spoken friend David represents the glue holding the Newsies
together throughout their strike along with Jack as their leader. David was the Newsie that created the
structure for their strike and temporarily when Jack became a scab David became the leader of the Newsies.

Works Cited
1.

"Similarities and Differences between Disney's Newsboy Strike and the Actual
Strike of 1899." Angel Fire. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Oct. 2014.
<http://www.angelfire.com/nj4/annimh/realdiffsim.html>.

2.

"Newsboy's Strike (1899)." Open Websites at The University of Texas. Andirea

White, n.d. Web. 12 Oct. 2014. <http://ows.edb.utexas.edu/site/
newsboys-strike-1899>.