THE IRISHMAN, A Martin Scorsese Picture with de Niro, Pacino, Pesci, Keitel

"Actually, we're very concerned."

I'd be interested in seeing statistics on percentage of voice-over narration before and after Goodfellas.

to me the differences... were the difference

(xpost to my own post): Put that in the seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time department.

Another big difference between this one and its predecessors, besides letting the characters live long enough to get really old, was of course more or less writing women out of it entirely, which of course also meant no token nag/harridan character a la GoodFellas and Casino. I wonder if there was an earlier draft that included 15 minutes of Frank get yelled at by his daughter.

But again, it's much longer than those other movies. There were more similarities than differences, imo, but rather than cut some of those similarities they just made it longer to allow for some new stuff. Pretty indulgent, in that regard, even if I didn't think it was too long and even if I liked it just fine. Better than Casino, iirc.

Nag/harridan doesnt seem right re: Goodfellas imo

otm I think Karen is a person who is loyal to a fault and the marriage is disastrous not bc it’s falling apart but because she stays with him and gets caught in the inescapable trap, shes not portrayed as a nag or anything. Nor is Sharon Stone I think her character is in it for the money and is clearly cold to an extent but there are moments where you can also see she realizes she’s trapped, like this one breakdown she has where Sam thinks he’s reassuring her and she’s crying like she knows there’s no escaping him. and her reason for running back to Lester a couple times has little to do with Lester and more to do with Sam. Sam has tries to rescue her but he’s really kidnapping her and bringing her back into mob custody.

Also Morbs otm

eh, it's been a while, so that could be fair. I mostly remember them as if not nags then certainly treated as such by the male leads, which I suppose in these worlds is functionally the same.

id say that the idea that we are using the male leads of scorseses gangster movies as our moral arbitration committee is so easily and often debunked that im not even gonna

lol true, but they are the leads, and it is their story, and they take up the majority of the screen time, which doesn't always lead to the most nuanced of female portrayals, at least in his gangster films. I did not find, say, Leo et al. sympathetic in Wolf, and when women in that one are treated like meat it's clearly (to me) a negative reflection on the amoral male characters, who outright pursue amorality and hedonism not as spoils, but for the sake of it. Yet the male leads in his gangster films seem to be slightly more romanticized, despicable people but often forced to adhere to that type not strictly because of a moral failing but because of a code or a system or something they're stuck with. Or as this movie puts it, "it's what it is."

If you think Hill, Rothstein, or Sheeran are romanticized idk what to tell you, Hill is clearly an oaf whose almost only half a gangster who isn’t even good at it, he just enjoys the ride for as long as he can until he decided to run his own scheme and it promptly destroys the lives of everyone around him (some of them his ultimately vv fair weather friends), Rothstein is a cold dude who can’t even relate to people in a normal way, he’s similarly not in control, he’s at the mercy of those around him, and ultimately is exiled and alone with his numbers. Sheeran obv is a pathetic character, who’s never even living the life, he’s just doing what he’s told for no true reward and it leaves him abandoned and even more alone. The thing about all of those protagonists is their gangster lives are ones w illusions of power and control, only kept alive by luck and the good will of others which all too easily can disappear. It’s the stories of three men lucky enough to not get killed but unlucky enough to have chosen a certain path with certain types of people even worse than they are, and it leaves them all with nothing.

They’re not more romanticized than the female leads nor more nuanced I think by nature supporting characters don’t get the same screen time but Karen and Ginger are fairly nuanced in their own ways, nuances overshadowed by charismatic and large type performances. Interesting to me is how Hill keeps fucking Karen over but she’s his only true ally in the end. And interesting how Ginger can’t escape the life so she stays in it and escapes to Sam’s best friend, at first out of desperation, later maybe as a desperate gamble to enlist him to kill Sam. They’re good characters.

Yeah, I guess I meant romanticized in the sense that they are entertaining, charismatic characters deigned to hold your attention. Though yeah, Sheeran (and most of the dudes) in this one are all pretty pathetic, with Sheeran maybe the most sociopathic of them all. I suppose the lack of charisma *is* the hook in The Irishman. This is def. the least of the three to plays as An Entertainment, and maybe the only that could also be titled Dead Inside.

Criterion release extras:

https://www.criterion.com/films/30553-the-irishman

New 4K digital master, approved by director Martin Scorsese, with Dolby Atmos soundtrack on the Blu-ray
Newly edited roundtable conversation among Scorsese and actors Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, and Joe Pesci, originally recorded in 2019
New documentary about the making of the film featuring Scorsese; the lead actors; producers Emma Tillinger Koskoff, Jane Rosenthal, and Irwin Winkler; director of photography Rodrigo Prieto; and others from the cast and crew
New video essay written and narrated by film critic Farran Smith Nehme about The Irishman’s synthesis of Scorsese’s singular formal style
The Evolution of Digital De-aging, a 2019 program on the visual effects created for the film
Archival interview excerpts with Frank “the Irishman” Sheeran and International Brotherhood of Teamsters trade union leader Jimmy Hoffa
An essay by critic Geoffrey O’Brien

The Irishman’s synthesis of Scorsese’s singular formal style

Does that mean anything? If you have a unique formal style, you have it; what's being synthesized?

1.) Someone finally made a movie about how violent Irishmen are.

2.) Plenty of times it looked like Robin Williams was playing the lead character. Or John Wayne.

3.) Can't shake the idea that this is Marty's big send-off, getting the gang back together for one last hurrah. Until 2039 when A.I. finishes The Irishman II.

4.) How come they didn't CGI Pacino's eyes to be blue either?

5.) And it was still Pacino the whole time. Even Jack Nicholson melted into that character better.

6.) Kudos for not having Danny DeVito thrown into the the fire with him though.

In all, yes it was a good movie. How could it not have been? The way Scorsese keeps putting Pesci in these roles where he's either too old or too short for the part, and yet, he keeps hitting them out of the park is a wonder.

But I never could get used to the CGI. Pesci's head looks like it's floating on top of his body in some scenes. Body doubles seemed more obvious than ever. Pacino almost looked like the baby from the Wayans Brothers movie at some points. How foolish would it have been if CGI had been around in 1973 and Brando got to play DeNiro's part in Godfather II? Brando one of the greatest actors of all time, and still, it would've looked wrong.

Was I able to suspend my belief and enjoy this? Yeah. Not sure why I needed to though.

6.) Kudos for not CGI'ing in the little kid from The Piano to play Peggy.