Once were Goodfellas

[steveeeeeeeee]

I caught the second half of "Goodfellas" on TV last night, from the moment Henry beats up Karen's neighbour who'd molested her. I insisted that my girlfriend should watch the second half with me, because this was one of my favourite movies of all time and I hadn't seen it in over a decade. So we watched the last hour or so of the film and it left me completely deflated, it had aged terribly. The story was told either poorly or made too obvious with unnecessary voice-overs. And the soundtrack, which I was once in awe of, seemed poorly mixed, tracks cut out at ill-chose points or segued into one another horribly. All the scenes were short, lacked any depth and amounted to little more than Joe Pesci blowing someone's brains out.

I've been thinking about why it appeared so bad quite a bit this morning. The most obvious reason is that the second half of Goodfellas is actually not very good. It's the first half-hour of the film that really blows you away, the beginning is just so good you forget about the later faults. The other reason I didn't enjoy it was the fact that it's been plagiarised to death by Guy Ritchie and company, and what seemed fast paced and exciting now appears old-hat, even if it was the standard setter of the genre.

The one fascinating thing about watching it is the amount of characters who have gone on to not only be in The Sopranos but as The Wire. The doctor who insists on giving Henry a quick blood pressure test towards the end was none other than Clay "sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-it" Davis.

[WOM]

Once were Goodfellas

One of the three films - the other two being The Shawshank Redemption and The Great Escape - that I will sit down and watch, at whatever point I happen to come in, until the end, every time.

It may be a collection of bad scenes, but it adds up to a great film.

[steveeeeeeeee]

Once were Goodfellas

I've been thinking about it even more and I think the arrival of "The Sopranos" in the period of time between my two previous viewings has sort of changed the way gangster drama should be played out. Stuff just happens in "The Sopranos", the viewer doesn't need a voice over to explain a plot twist, the director trusts the viewer will pick up the thread and being confused about characters and plot paths is part of the fun.

The style of direction in Goodfellas was arguably groundbreaking back then, I remember a friend at school telling me "you HAVE TO see this movie", when it came out in the UK. I've always loved it, but watching it last night reminded me of The Hills or The City from MTV. Sadly, I think the film's legacy is that type of drama which is low on depth, high on loud music, scene changes and not much actually happening.

[hobbes]

Once were Goodfellas

It's not a bad film but at least an hour too long.

[WOM]

Once were Goodfellas

You sure you're not thinking of Casino? It runs 3 hours.

[Anton Gramscescu]

Once were Goodfellas

Goodfellas looks clumsy because it spells everything out while the Sopranos doesn't. But the reason Sopranos doesn't need to spell everything out is because Goodfellas (and Donnie Brasco, too, I guess) already did so. So it's kind of an unfair comparison.

[ooh aah]

Once were Goodfellas

I have, for some time now, believed that of the two Casino is actually the better film, but because Goodfellas came first, it has the better rep

[steveeeeeeeee]

Once were Goodfellas

Antonio Gramsci wrote:

Goodfellas looks clumsy because it spells everything out while the Sopranos doesn't. But the reason Sopranos doesn't need to spell everything out is because Goodfellas (and Donnie Brasco, too, I guess) already did so. So it's kind of an unfair comparison.

I'm not too sure I agree. Goodfellas v Sopranos is an unfair comparison because The Sopranos has infinitely more time to play with to develop the story and can afford to play with the viewer.

Goodfellas has a miniscule amount of time to play with, but there are so many unnecessary scenes. The scene with Spider, whilst one of the great scenes in the film, adds nothing to the film. Joe Pesci is a nutter, this is made clear in the first half hour of the film, why waste time going over it all again? The answer is basically because the film, past that increidble introduction, is nothing more than rock'n'roll music cut to images of people getting whacked or doing drugs. When I was 15, I thought that was amazing. When I was 25, I thought that was amazing. Last night, at almost 35 years of age, I found it a bit shallow and old hat.

[Pietro Paolo Virdis]

Once were Goodfellas

steveeeeeeeee wrote:

The other reason I didn't enjoy it was the fact that it's been plagiarised to death by Guy Ritchie and company

Martin plagiarised himself. Mean Streets being the original.
But it's a damn good film.

[G-Man]

Once were Goodfellas

I saw GoodFellas again (for the umpteenth time) yesterday, and did not have steeeeevie's impressions.

The long day-before-the-arrest sequence is quite brilliant. And the Spider scene is necessary, I think, to turn us against Pesci's character. Before, he was just a bit crazy, killing a wise guy because he was provoked. But after killing Spider, we don't have any sympathy for him, and question why Henry and DeNiro's character stick with him (well, it is explained; Pesci is going to be made etc).

[Edie St Pierre]

Once were Goodfellas

I've always thought of it as an incredibly violent version of 'Only Fools and Horses'. De Niro as Del Boy, Liotta as Rodney and Pesci as a psychotic Uncle Albert.

I still like it a lot too, to be honest.

[Lucia Lanigan]

Once were Goodfellas

Brilliant!

[steveeeeeeeee]

Once were Goodfellas

Goodplonkas?

[Guest]

Once were Goodfellas

Yeah, I always love Goodfellas. Mean Streets is more of a masterpiece, but I love Goodfellas. Community, which is getting better and better, did a great Goodfellas episode last week.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Once were Goodfellas

I think one of the problems of those two movies is that they're first person accounts based on true events which leads the director down a certain path.

Though they could just have told us that joe pesci's actual character was 6'1", a lady killer, and was actually primarily shot for trying to rape karen while henry was in jail. Then we could have avoided the whole joe pesci unpleasantness.

[De Geas Clean Linen]

Once were Goodfellas

Casino gets a bad rap. I think its on a par with Goodfellas, to be fair. The only problem with Casino is that Pesci basically plays the same character in both.

I own both movies on DVD and will always watch them all the way through when I stick them in. I revisited Donnie Brasco a couple weeks ago on YouTube and will probably add that to my collection as well...

[Guest]

Once were Goodfellas

I too think Casino is the better film in all respects, and Goodfellas suceeds almost entirely as a piece of style, but what style. I saw it in the cinema when it opened and I remember people applauding en masse at the end. It was riveting and invigorating, and proved as important to the direction and feel of nineties cinema as Pulp Fiction.

One sentence from steveeeeeeeee's initial post I must take issue with, though, is this: "The story was told either poorly or made too obvious with unnecessary voice-overs and the soundtrack, which I was once in awe of, seemed poorly mixed, tracks cut out at ill-chose points or segued into one another horribly". That's madness, plain and simple. Both the sound and picture editing are absolutely incredible and wonderfully idiosyncratic; a deliberate fusion of almost brutal narrative authority and ragged nouvelle vague self-reflexivity, with scorsese pushing his style further than he ever had and in the process creating a new subgenre. The choice and use of music is always one of the most telling aspects of scorsese's cinema and what steveeeeeeeee mishears and dismisses as poor mixing and bad segueing are in fact some of the most self-assured examples of his very personal art.

[steveeeeeeeee]

Once were Goodfellas

"scorsese pushing his style further than he ever had"

I disagree. Pushing it was "Taxi Driver", "The King of Comedy" or "Raging Bull". Those films have style which is singularly his and has never been matched, although many have tried. They can't be copied because they're unique and "self-assured examples of his very personal art." Goodfellas, twenty years on, has been copied to death and comes across as no better than an MTV drama. It was incredible at the time, but in retrospect, it was a step backwards by Scorsese.

"It was riveting and invigorating, and proved as important to the direction and feel of nineties cinema as Pulp Fiction."

I think it's a bit harsh on Tarantino to say Goodfellas outlined the direction and feel of Pulp Fiction. I'd guess Tarantino had the style and direction of Pulp Fiction planned out in his head way before he saw Goodfellas. Sadly, the legacy of Goodfellas is "Trainspotting", "Lock, Stock..." and crap like "Human Traffic".

"steveeeeeeeee mishears and dismisses as poor mixing and bad segueing are in fact some of the most self-assured examples of his very personal art."

It's not all bad, but some of it is awful - the part where he's trying to sell the guns is really bad. The bit where they find all the dead bodies of the gangsters who participated in the Lufthansa heist is incredible.

[Sundeporino]

Once were Goodfellas

I sat next to the other girl on the blind date during a NY-LA flight once. Eli Wallach's daughter she was. As you were.

[Felicity, I guess so]

Once were Goodfellas

Eli Wallach, who turns up in a 'was THAT Eli Wallach?!' cameo in 'The Ghost'. As you were.