Desperate times call for desperation measures. A saying that breeds violence and another saying: violence breeds violence. Attacks and frays also gave rise to infamous factions called gangs. Civil unrest amongst these pitiful parties leads to corrupt redemption to make a living, survive, and thrive in a cruel, unforgiving world. It is the classic moral play about learning the rules in order to break them. Teenagers and young adults break the mold and test the waters, sometimes unknowingly, to change their perception of and place in the world.
Gangs, fictional and real, are born out of necessity. They are the individuals that fell through the cracks of society looking for a better future. When they could not find it, they took matters into their own hands; some started a revolution in the process; others remained black sheep after the dust settled. The paths they carved for themselves are precarious yet inspiring. Gangs, you are either with them or without them.
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8 Green Street Hooligans (2005)
Universal Pictures
Frodo found a different ring to rule them all here in the grimy backstreets of London. Elijah Wood plays Harvard-expelled journalism student, Matt Buckner. After the school discovers cocaine in his dorm, belonging to his well-to-do roommate, he is wrongfully accused of possessing it. Rather than defend himself, he takes his roommate’s family’s hush money and meets Pete (Charlie Hunnam of Sons of Anarchy), a history teacher and gang leader of football hooliganism with his firm, Green Street Elite. A fictionalized period piece surrounding the sport-related violence in the United Kingdom, Green Street Hooligans feels close to the vest in terms of criminal camaraderie.
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7 The Wanderers (1979)
Warner Bros.
From the director of the remake of The Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978), Philip Kaufman brings a gangster coming-of-age film that predates The Outsiders film adaptation by a few years. It is a slightly different vessel, featuring Italian (the Wanderers), African (the Del Bombers), Chinese (the Wongs), and Irish-American (the Ducky Boys) gangs fighting for power in the Bronx; you know, living the American dream. Like the distinct gang members, the gang names are also memorable. Diversity is not dead, but the diverse gang members risk death, dames, and manifest destiny in this cult-status flick.
6 Gangs of New York (2002)
Miramax Films
An American tale about blood, sweat, tears, and sociopolitical influence through the ranks of rivalry gangs in late-19th century New York. Heavy hitters like Daniel Day-Lewis and Leonardo DiCaprio bounce off each other as the latter plots a mole-style murder against the first who took his father’s life and claimed dominion over the ground they more or less share. Martin Scorsese’s historical drama forgives the past’s trespasses and recognizes that time may be forgotten, but what built history will always be remembered.
5 West Side Story (1961)
United Artists
Inspired by William Shakespeare’s young lovers’ quarrel play, Romeo and Juliet, which was inspired by Arthur Brooke’s 1562 The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet, this musical about Manhattan’s Upper West Side youths in gangs is grounded in similar controversies from its source material. Rather than the disapproving Italian families of power-struggling notoriety, the Montagues and Capulets, you have the rivaling Puerto Rican Sharks and the white Jets. Tony (Romeo) is a former Jet and friend to the leader of the Jets, Riff, who falls in love with Maria (Juliet), who is the sister of Bernardo, the leader of the Sharks. The musical was praised and significant for its genre-breaking focus on darker themes and social commentary such as cultural misunderstandings, violence as false learning or an alternative to constructive living for impressionable or developing young people, and unwavering bigotry.
4 Boyz n the Hood (1991)
Columbia Pictures
Capturing the urban African American culture of the 1990s, Boyz n the Hood began as an application to film school for famed director, John Singleton. The story surrounds college-bound Tres Styles (Cuba Gooding, Jr.) who lives with his father Furious Styles (Laurence Fishburne) in South Central Los Angeles. He grows up with his best friend Doughboy (Ice Cube) who becomes a Crips member, and despite having regular conflicts with the Blood gang, teaches Tres life lessons in the dog-eat-dog world in the hood. For this cinematic debut, Singleton was the first African American and the youngest person at age 24 to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director. Boyz n the Hood was preserved in the National Film Registry and deemed cultural, historically, or aesthetically significant by the United States Library of Congress in 2002.
3 Menace II Society (1993)
New Line Cinema
The Hughes Brothers debut film in the same vein as Boyz n the Hood, Menace II Society recounts the lives of O-Dog (Larenz Tate) and Caine (Tyrin Turner) who grow up in the housing projects of Los Angeles in gang territory. They both commit crimes, but Caine has more of a conscience while O-Dog is known for being a live wire. The film’s visceral violence, profanity, and drug use, along with the urban realism of its potent performances, earned it a lasting reputation.
2 The Warriors (1979)
Paramount Pictures
A fictional gang is blamed for the murder of another gang’s leader and must confront them in a turf war on Coney Island. The film’s focus on the adolescent mindset through a gang’s point of view shows how impressionable minds are shaped so easily by vandalism and violence. Developing a personal identity, navigating the world, and taking claim of what represents who you are is never easy.
1 The Outsiders (1983)
The Outsiders is the classic coming-of-age teen drama from author S.E. Hinton about the Greasers and the Socs. No other gangs are more recognizable than these two polar opposites. Francis Ford Coppola received a letter and petition from Lone Star Elementary School asking him to make the adaptation. He directed the dawn of the Brat Pack genre, alongside fellow up-and-comers like Ralph Macchio, Tom Cruise, Rob Lowe, Patrick Swayze, and Emilio Estevez. Everyone feels like an outsider at some point, but there is a place for all of us to belong to, a place where we can stay gold like Ponyboy.
