Martin Scorsese’s Gangs of New York opens first with sound, and then with an image. Before the viewer can see anything, s/he hears a sound that could be cutting or razing; then, the camera shows a close-up of Priest Vallon’s face, and one can see that the sharp sound came from the razor Vallon uses to shave his face.
The lighting in this scene is interesting; the faces of both Vallon and Amsterdam are partially covered in both light and shadow. This brings an element of ambiguity into the picture. While Vallon’s intentions are honorable and he believes in the righteousness of what he is doing, the gruesome gang violence in which he partakes is inherently dark and immoral. The actions that Vallon prepares to take against the Natives contrast with his pious intentions–a holy man about to do something indisputably unholy. The viewer sees him carefully dress himself in traditional Catholic clerical clothing, which is his literal and figurative suit of armor.
Surrounded by dim candlelight and the dirt-brown walls of a cave-like structure, Vallon and young Amsterdam almost appear to be living in the medieval Dark Ages rather than mid nineteenth-century New York. The historical implications of this sort of setting strengthen the idea that Vallon is leading a crusade.
Another important aspect of this brief scene is the nature of father-son interaction. For one, the camera angles of this scene make the audience a part of the intimacy as they alternately view both Amsterdam’s and Priest Vallon’s faces at eye-level from the other’s perspective. It is also interesting to note how Vallon puts Amsterdam up on the table before talking to him about Saint Michael. With Amsterdam standing on the table, his father can speak to him at eye-level, signifying that Priest Vallon now views, and will therefore treat, Amsterdam as an equal in the struggle for the Catholic faith and against the injustice of the Natives.
After Priest Vallon adorns Amsterdam with the silver pendant of St. Michael and Amsterdam affirms to his father Saint Michael’s role in casting Satan out of paradise, the scene ends with Amsterdam blowing out the candle. This exchange between Amsterdam and his father, embodied in the entire scene, conveys the passage of a tradition of coexisting religious faith and violence from a father to his son. As the older Amsterdam (Leonardo DiCaprio) talks about this moment in a voice over, the audience can understand its importance to the rest of the film.
