The Town vs. West Side Story--Differences and Similarities:

One could successfully argue that both The Town and West Side Story are comparable in the following respects:

A) That they both take place in rough, run-down urban areas.

B) Both have gangs/gangsters and toughs (or did back then)

C) Both have romances that developed across certain barriers, amid urban gang warfare and conflict.

D) Both films involved conflict with the law.

E) Both movies involved people falling in love who had fantasies about eloping together that
just simply could not and would not be, given the circumstances from which their romances had arisen, to begin with.

F) Both involved the use of street drugs and alcohol

G) Both lawmen exhibited cynical hatred and/or bigotry towards the people with whom they dealt with every day.

H). Both Maria and Claire found out who and what the men they fell in love with were and what they'd done, through sort of a go-between, if one gets the drift, and ultimately tried to kick them out, in anger.

I) In both The Town and West Side Story,, the same circumstances which had brought the romancing characters together in the first place also ended up separating them, in the end.

The differences, however, are also rather striking, however.

A) Unlike Doug MacRay and his men, the Jets & Sharks in West Side Story, who were two different ethnic groups (i. e. the Jets, who were white European native Americans, and the newly-arrived Puerto Rican Sharks) were vying for territory, and also hated each other due to their cultural backgrounds, were not out robbing banks and armored trucks at gunpoint, taking people hostage and abducting them, nor did the Jets and the Sharks attempt to gun down law-enforcement people who were doing their job of bringing career criminals to justice before the law.

B) Unlike Doug MacRay, for example, who came off as gentlemanly, suave and charming, neither the Jets or Sharks in West Side Story even attempted to mask their overt hatred for each other, and their feuding ultimately resulted in a showdown--the rumble, which claimed the lives of both gang leaders, Riff and Bernardo, and, ultimately, Tony, afterwards..

C) Unlike Doug MacRay, who lied his way into Claire's heart about who he really was, and came off as a law-abiding citizen, when, in fact, he really wasn't, Tony did not do any such thing, because, unlike Doug MacRay, he wasn't a bank robber who wielded a gun in order to get what he wanted from people.

D) Maria, unlike The Town's Claire, on the other hand, although innocent, wasn't somebody with the responsible job of managing a bank and who should've known better, found Tony rather sincere (which he was), and fell in love with him, as well.

E) FBI Agent Adam Frawley had some sympathy for Claire, and sincerely wanted to help her avoid a potentially dangerous situation, even though her actions following the armed robbery of her bank, and her subsequently being taken as a hostage, abducted and let go on South Boston's Day Blvd, unlike Lt. Schrank, who had no sympathy for either any of the Puerto Ricans, including Maria and Anita, let alone the European-American Jets.

F) Doug MacRay, unlike either Riff or Bernardo in West Side Story, came off as very charming, kindly and gentlemanly, which was a very thin veneer, which, on occasion, revealed who Doug really was: for example: physically roughing up Jem's sister, Krista, during an argument and then physically pushing her against a wall, or sort of roughly grabbing Claire at one point, when he visited her in her garden.

G) Maria, unlike Claire, was unable to kick Tony out of her house, and she didn't want him to turn himself over to the police, even after learning that he'd stabbed Bernardo to death during the Rumble. Claire, on the other hand, did succeed in kicking Doug out of her condominium, but not out of her garden, when he came to visit her. Tony, unlike Doug MacRay, didn't get physically rough with Maria or any other girls, either. Unlike Doug MacRay, who sort of coerced Claire into listening to his bulls**t speeches, which were his way of attempting to win Claire back, Tony did no such thing to Maria.

H) Doug MacRay, unlike Tony, who ended up being gunned down by an angry, jealous Chino, right in the heart of the territory that both the Jets and Sharks had vied for and feuded over, ultimately had to leave for Florida, without Claire (who'd ultimately decided that being together with Doug was too risky, on the long run.) in the hopes of avoiding the law, but would more than likely be looking over his shoulder, until he was either caught (perhaps violently), and/or gunned down by the law.

I) The romance between Doug and Claire was not between different ethnic/racial groups, but merely between socioeconomic classes; Doug MacRay was from a rough-and-tough urban working-class (and criminal) background, while Claire, who was a bank manager, came from a somewhat better-off financially family, in the suburbs (Marblehead).

J) In The Town, while the rest of Doug MacRay's men (i. e. Jem, Dez and Glossy) lost their lives in a shoot-out at Boston's Fenway Park, between them and the law, Riff, Tony and Bernardo lost their lives to protracted urban gang warfare, in the heart of the territory of the city that they'd constantly vied for and feuded over for so long, but the rest of both the Jets and Sharks, and their girls, including Anita and Maria, all survived.

K) Doug MacRay bought an expensive diamond necklace for Claire(more than likely with "dirty" money, if one gets the drift.) as a present, even before Claire knew who he was and what he was up to. West Side Story's Tony, on the other hand, did not buy any gifts for Maria in order to prove his love for her...his sincerity was ample enough, plus Tony was much more honest than The Town's Doug MacRay.

L) Unlike The Town's Claire, Maria of West Side Story was not a bank manager, nor did she go out of her way to make dupes out of law enforcement people who were doing their job of trying to keep hoodlums and criminals in line, and to bring them to justice before the law.

M) One big and very striking difference between The Town and West Side Story, however, was the message that each of these films carried:

West Side Story carries a double-edged message: that arrogance, hubris and racial/ethnic hatred often lead to (gang) violence, physical and psychological injury and even actual death, but, in the very end, manages to rise again, leading to hints of possible intergroup reconciliation, and/or possible friendship.

The Town also carries a double-edge message: that arrogance and hubris lead to violence, physical and psychological injury, and death (Gloansy, Dez and Jem losing their lives in a shoot-out between Doug, his men and the law.), but Doug gets away unscathed, and leaves for Florida. Claire, on the other hand, turns out to not be the honest, innocent and confused person that she comes of as. She ends up not only deliberately making dupes out of FBI Agt. Frawley and his men by merely pretending to work with the law to help catch Doug MacRay and bring him to true justice before the law, but helping him get away by warning him away from her house with a "Sunny Days" code when one of the lawmen present in Claire's Charlestown apartment cocks his gun, but she ends taking money that's really not hers (it was blood-stained loot money that Doug had given to her.), and spends it on the renovation of the Charlestown ice hockey rink, instead anonymously turning that "dirty" money over to the proper authorities. Lack of accountability seems to be the order of the day, and the message in The Town, unlike in West Side Story, where everybody suffers the consequences of the behavior of bad actors.