The Pornography/Hypocrisy Angle in "Get Carter" (SPOILERS)
The street-level savagery of Get Carter has made the film a classic over the years. That and its very realistic Newcastle settings and Michael Caine's ultra-cool sociopathic performance.
But matters come to a head for the movie in that breakthrough scene in which Carter, lying in bed after a coital romp with a Newcastle "hooker in residence"(likely in the employ of local crime bosses to entertain themselves AND visitors, and thus not always requiring a paid trick) and plays the porno film on a projector in the bedroom.
The hooker's taking a bath as Carter watches the crummy, ultra-low budget "local production"(I guess we'd call it "amateur porn" today) ..and Carter suddenly sees his teenage niece appear on screen.
The cuts are away from the porn and to Carter's face, with his sociopathic savagery now undercut by...tears. Tears of family pain. Tears of disgust with the underbelly of his chosen profession(organized crime.) Tears of disgust with himself.
And that disgust turns to rage. First up for brutal payback: the hooker in the bathtub.
Others will pay as the film goes on from this point. Including Carter himself.
But the scene haunts, to this day, because: as heartbroken and disgusted as Carter is to see his own niece starring in a porno...did he ever care this much about all the OTHER girls exploited that way?
Indeed, "Get Carter" opens with Carter and some British crime bosses WATCHING porno...slides , not film (which is interestingly dated) and Carter doesn't much care about THOSE women.
On the other , other hand, as I recall , Carter doesn't choose to actually watch the porn with his bosses. He is looking out the window, concentrating on other things.
"Get Carter" makes a point, as it goes along, of indicating that in the male-centered British gangster world of 1971, the men are killers and crooks...but the women(beauties all) are to be sexual objects, bought and paid for by their male masters, one way or the other. This extends to the porn actresses, the hooker types in Newcastle(there are two and Carter harms them both), and to the London gangster's girlfriend(Britt Ekland) with whom Carter is carrying on an affair.
That Carter's young niece would be added to this sexual stable may enrage him to murder but...its just a part of the business really, isn't it?
To this day.