goodfellas

It's a great fucking gangster movie -- better than the Godfathers -- bcz, as reflected in a Jimmy Breslin quote I recently encountered, it doesn't deny that the Mob is about grade-school dropouts killing each other, instead of that phony romanticized shit.

wondering where this fits in to yr 'ride' based critique of scorseses later work

this is the first time I have ever seen morbz lavish praise upon a critically acclaimed movie on ILX

icey, it has brains and good acting, so there's no comparison.

and yet u must admit its very 'ridey'

dayo, that's bullshit. My favorite film of the '00s was Mulholland Dr.

(critically acclaimed)

no. a "ride" doesn't have a script. xp

to clarify morbz, this is the first time I have seen you actually explain what you like about a movie in a positive way

what negative ways have i used before?

do the godfathers really deny that the mob is about grade school dropouts killing each other? It's not like everyone's Michael in those films.

to clarify morbz, this is the first time I have seen you actually explain what you like about a movie in a positive way

Read one Spielberg thread.

Since when is saying "at least it isn't romanticized phony shit" positive in the first place?

cuz it speaks well of Pileggi and Scorsese's judgment in avoiding a trap, and in talking UP to the audience.

before you explain how the Godfather talks down the audience, can you explain how it denies that the mob is about numbskulls killing each other?

cuz while the tone is pretty operatic and grand (not sure I'd call that talking down to the audience, though), its still mostly a bunch of guys shooting each other.

hey vaffanculo ya goombahs.

SHASTA OUT

But in the scene at Tommy’s house, where Martin Scorsese’s mother has her cameo fixing the guys dinner and Billy Batts is outside bleeding to death in the trunk, Henry is laughing with the others over the Batts being a goner. In his heart, Henry is as much of a murderer as they are. But in the film he’s just an accomplice to murder.

Did this guy see the same movie that I did? Was it him laughing or was it him always being so quiet?

He may have gone heh heh to keep up the cover, but he wasn't anywhere near being the murderer Tommy and Jimmy were.

Read one Spielberg thread.

― Eric H., Wednesday, September 29, 2010 11:08 AM (37 minutes ago) Bookmark

ILX has speilberg threads?

how about the end of godfather 2 when michael kills his brother and basically damns himself to hell

SPOILER ALERT s1ocki :(

ian grey's moralizing in that article is super-tiresome

At the end, Henry doesn't care about the piles of corpses he has passive-aggressively accumulated. He's bummed because he can't get a good red sauce (Rim shot!) in witness protection.

o no they don't all hug and learn at the end

croup, there's all that bullshit about Vito being against narcotics trade, and how they're really just a loving family that went astray

there's the very same bullshit about the patron (Pauly Sorvino) being against the narcotics trade in Goodfellas Morbsies. Ayyyy vaffanculo *grabs nuts*

I guess one upside of "Goodfellas" is that without it, we wouldn't have Showtime’s "Dexter," an infinitely more complex work on almost every level except visually.

leave the guns, grab the nuts

nothing to see here folks

*bites knuckle a la bowzer in sha na na*

I guess one upside of "Goodfellas" is that without it, we wouldn't have Showtime’s "Dexter," an infinitely more complex work on almost every level except visually.

Speaking of morality in American entertainment...

croup, there's all that bullshit about Vito being against narcotics trade

surprised you of all people don't believe an old guy could get arbitrarily moralistic about the good old days

and how they're really just a loving family that went astray

I really don't get how you could get this from the two films, but even if you did, that doesn't mean the film denies the thuggish nature of the mob - if anything that's the corrupting element.

godfather is definitely a more romantic movie than goodfellas, but someone could easily say that goodfellas is more cynical and cartoonish

From the first line, "As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster," the film proclaims its limitations. Because Martin Scorsese does not do psychology, the best one could expect is a portrait of machismo in crisis situation -- which means brilliantly rendered violence from which the main characters learn nothing.

I don't get how the second part follows the first - is all of that really contained in the line "As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster"

also lol at drawing arbitrary distinction between art and not art by inclusion of nihilism

But because I had been a first wave punk rocker, I knew those buzzes were not to be trusted

nuh uh, not gonna get fooled again, nope

The things I loved about "Goodfellas" -- the wedding where every man is named Peter or Paul and all the women Marie; De Niro getting pissed about the silencers not fitting the guns; the guys making a nice pork sauce in prison; even Henry beating the crap out of that douche bag that hurt Karen -- I still treasure. The rest I reckon I'll be dealing with from different angles, as long as I'm around to reckon.

yeah....have fun with that.

But because I had been a first wave punk rocker, I knew those buzzes were not to be trusted

lol, fuck this idiot

ian grey's moralizing in that article is super-tiresome

― If Airplanes Could Fly This Place Would Be An Airport (s1ocki), Wednesday, September 29, 2010 3:49 AM (6 hours ago) Bookmark

seriously. it's not like goodfellas isn't already a moralistic film; the second half of the movie is basically all about hill's life of crime becoming increasingly more unsustainable and pathetic.

Don't get me wrong, The (first) Godfather is a very good movie, it's just a lie. So were most of the great Cagney gangster films before White Heat.

Shasta, the fallout from Pauly's opposition to drug trade doesnt have the same weight or consequences of Vito's, so stfu

The (first) Godfather is a very good movie, it's just a lie.

Not sure Goodfellas is that much more "the truth," feels like the difference is tone rather than content in a lot of ways, but I'm glad to hear you say this. Was tempted to ask if you hated Citizen Kane for piling "phony romantic bullshit" on the newspaper industry.

that gq oral history is quite magnificent, no

well i think the difference is a lot in the details croups... i get the feeling that mario puzo was just making stuff up as he went along whereas the specifics of gfellas is what makes it great.

that's fair to a point, and I can see why someone would prefer either. But the idea that Goodfellas is inherently better for reveling in the thuggish, criminal side rather than an immigrant dynasty feels as moralistic and arbitrary as Mr. Grey's reasons for acclaiming Casino and Shutter Island.

feel like morbs def has a point here, tho its maybe overstated, a lot of peoples love for the godfathers is on a 'arent these people magical' type level due to the flakey romanticism of the thing

that's so weird to me

i like 'the godfather' and 'goodfellas'

everyone in the godfather is completely miserable

not sure a lot of people's Goodfellas love is any more considered

xpost

no but godfather def has this 'family' thing that gives it a warm glow. i agree. and that might be dishonest. but it is why people love it so much. you want to be hanging out with these guys. you want to be tom hagen, the adopted member of the family.

the sheen of power fascinates - while i certainly enjoy some godfathers feel like slocki has a strong point re the positive atributes of verisimilitude

plenty of goodfellas fans want to hang out with those guys, some because they wish they got kick the shit out of people all the time