Write the first paragraph of your article here. Write the first section of your article here. Remember to include links to other pages on the wiki. Award Snub: Goodfellas, Scorsese, and Braco lost to Dances with Wolves, Kevin Costner, and Whoopi Goldberg for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Supporting Actress, respectively. In hindsight, Goodfellas is considered Scorsese's Magnum Opus.
Running time 145 minutes Country United States Language English Budget $25 million Box office $46.8 million Goodfellas (stylized GoodFellas) is a 1990 American directed. It is an of the 1985 non-fiction book by, who co-wrote the screenplay with Scorsese. The film narrates the rise and fall of mob associate and his friends and family from 1955 to 1980. Scorsese initially titled the film Wise Guy and postponed making it; later, he and Pileggi changed the title to Goodfellas.
To prepare for their roles in the film, and often spoke with Pileggi, who shared research material left over from writing the book. According to Pesci, improvisation and ad-libbing came out of rehearsals wherein Scorsese gave the actors freedom to do whatever they wanted. The director made transcripts of these sessions, took the lines he liked best and put them into a revised script, which the cast worked from during principal photography. Made on a budget of $25 million, Goodfellas grossed $46.8 million. It received positive reviews from critics and was nominated for six, including and, with Pesci winning for.
The film won five awards from the, including. Additionally, Goodfellas was named the year's best film by various critics' groups. Goodfellas is widely regarded as one of the greatest films in the gangster genre. In 2000, it was deemed 'culturally, historically, and aesthetically significant' and selected for preservation in the by the United States. Its content and style have been emulated in numerous other films and television series.
Contents. Plot In 1955, a high school student, becomes enamored of the criminal life in his neighborhood, and begins working for Paul 'Paulie' Cicero and his associates: James 'Jimmy the Gent' Conway, a truck hijacker; and Tommy DeVito, a fellow. Henry begins as for Jimmy, gradually working his way up to more serious crimes. Enjoying the perks of their criminal life, the three associates spend most of their nights at the nightclub, carousing with women. Henry starts dating, a Jewish woman from the area of.
Karen is initially troubled by Henry's criminal activities, but is eventually seduced by his glamorous lifestyle. They marry, despite her parents' disapproval. In 1970, member Billy Batts repeatedly insults Tommy at a nightclub owned by Henry. Enraged, Tommy and Jimmy attack and kill him. The murder of a would warrant retribution from the Gambinos; another made man, possibly even Paulie, would be forced to kill the perpetrators. Knowing this, Jimmy, Henry, and Tommy cover up the murder. They transport the body in the trunk of Henry's car, and bury it in upstate New York.
Six months later, Jimmy learns that the burial site is slated for development, forcing them to exhume and relocate the decomposing corpse. A jealous Karen harasses Henry's mistress Janice and holds Henry at gunpoint. Henry moves in with Janice, but Paulie insists he return to Karen after collecting a debt from a gambler in with Jimmy. Upon returning, Jimmy and Henry are arrested after being turned in by the gambler's sister, an typist, and receive ten-year prison sentences.
In order to support his family on the outside, Henry has drugs smuggled in by Karen and sells them to a fellow inmate from. In 1978, Henry is and expands this cocaine business against Paulie's orders, soon involving Jimmy and Tommy. Jimmy organizes a crew to raid the at and take $6 million. After some members buy expensive items against Jimmy's orders and the getaway truck is found by police, he has most of the crew murdered. In his narration, as dead bodies are being discovered all over the city, Henry implicitly theorizes that Jimmy would have killed them anyway rather than share the profits of the heist. Tommy and Henry are spared by Jimmy.
Tommy, however, is tricked into believing he is to become a made man and is ultimately shot dead in retribution for Batts' murder. By 1980, Henry has become a from cocaine use and insomnia. He sets up a drug deal with his Pittsburgh associates, but is arrested by narcotics agents and jailed. After bailing him out, Karen explains that she flushed $60,000 worth of cocaine down the toilet to prevent FBI agents from finding it during their raid, leaving the family virtually penniless. Feeling betrayed by Henry's drug dealing, Paulie gives him $3,200 and ends their association. Following a routine visit, Karen barely escapes a probable murder attempt by Jimmy.
Henry meets Jimmy in a diner and is asked to travel on a; the novelty of such a request makes Henry suspicious. Facing federal charges, and realizing Jimmy plans to have him and Karen killed, Henry decides to enroll in the, even though it means that Karen will not be able to see her parents.
He gives sufficient testimony to have Paulie and Jimmy arrested and convicted. Forced out of his gangster life, Henry now has to face living in the real world. He narrates 'I'm an average nobody.
I get to live the rest of my life like a '. The end title cards reveal that Henry is still a and was arrested in 1987 in for narcotics conspiracy, receiving five years probation. He has been clean since then. After 25 years of marriage, Henry and Karen separated in 1989. Paulie died in 1988 in Fort Worth Federal Prison at the age of 73 from respiratory illness. Jimmy is serving a twenty-years-to-life sentence in a New York prison for murder and will not be eligible for parole until 2004, when he will be 78 years old. as.
Christopher Serrone as young Henry. as James 'Jimmy the Gent' Conway. as Tommy DeVito. Joseph D'Onofrio as young Tommy. as.
as Paul 'Paulie' Cicero. as Frankie Carbone. as.
as Sonny Bunz. as Frenchy. as Morrie Kessler. as Tuddy Cicero. as Parnell 'Stacks' Edwards. as Tommy DeVito's mother. as Sandy.
as Spider. as Tony Stacks Production Development Goodfellas is based on New York crime reporter 's book Wiseguy.
Martin Scorsese did not intend to make another mob film, but he saw a review of Pileggi's book, which he then read while working on the set of in 1986. He had always been fascinated by the lifestyle and was drawn to Pileggi's book because it was the most honest portrayal of gangsters he had ever read. After reading Pileggi's book, the filmmaker knew what approach he wanted to take: 'To begin Goodfellas like a gunshot and have it get faster from there, almost like a two-and-a-half-hour trailer.
I think it's the only way you can really sense the exhilaration of the lifestyle, and to get a sense of why a lot of people are attracted to it.' According to Pileggi, Scorsese cold-called the writer and told him, 'I've been waiting for this book my entire life', to which Pileggi replied, 'I've been waiting for this phone call my entire life'. Scorsese decided to postpone making the film when funds materialized in 1988 to make. He was drawn to the documentary aspects of Pileggi's book. 'The book Wise Guys gives you a sense of the day-to-day life, the tedium, how they work, how they take over certain nightclubs, and for what reasons. It shows how it's done'.
He saw Goodfellas as the third film in an unplanned trilogy of films that examined the lives of Italian-Americans 'from slightly different angles'. He has often described the film as 'a mob home movie' that is about money, because 'that's what they're really in business for'. Two weeks in advance of the filming, the real was paid $480,000.
Screenplay Scorsese and Pileggi collaborated on the screenplay, and over the course of the 12 drafts it took to reach the ideal script, the reporter realized 'the visual styling had to be completely redone. So we decided to share credit'. They decided which sections of the book they liked and put them together like building blocks.
Scorsese persuaded Pileggi that they did not need to follow a traditional narrative structure. The director wanted to take the gangster film and deal with it episode by episode, but start in the middle and move backwards and forwards. Scorsese would compact scenes and realized that if they were kept short, 'the impact after about an hour and a half would be terrific'.
He wanted to do the voiceover like the opening of and use 'all the basic tricks of the from around 1961'. The names of several real-life gangsters were altered for the film: became the character Tommy DeVito; became Paulie Cicero, and was portrayed as Jimmy Conway. Pileggi and Scorsese decided to change the title of their film to Goodfellas because two contemporary projects, the 1986 film and the 1987–1990 TV series had used similar titles.
Casting Once agreed to play Conway, Scorsese was able to secure the money needed to make the film. The director cast after De Niro saw him in 's , and Scorsese was surprised by 'his explosive energy' in that film.
Liotta had read Pileggi's book when it came out and was fascinated by it. A couple of years afterwards, his agent told him Scorsese was going to direct a film version. In 1988, he met the director over a period of a couple of months and auditioned for the film. He campaigned aggressively for a role, but the studio wanted a well-known actor. He later said 'I think they would've rather had than me'. To prepare for the role, De Niro consulted with Pileggi, who had research material that had been discarded while writing the book. De Niro often called Hill several times a day to ask how Burke walked, held his cigarette, and so on.
Driving to and from the set, Liotta listened to FBI audio cassette tapes of Hill, so he could practice speaking like his real-life counterpart. To research her role, tried to get close to a mob wife but was unable to, because they exist in a very tight-knit community.
She decided not to meet the real Karen, saying she 'thought it would be better if the creation came from me. I used her life with her parents as an emotional guideline for the role'. Had no problem finding the voice and walk of his character, but found it challenging finding what he called 'that kernel of coldness and absolute hardness that is antithetical to my nature except when my family is threatened'. Photography The film was shot on location in, and parts of during the spring and summer of 1989, with a budget of $25 million.
Scorsese broke the film down into sequences and everything because of the complicated style throughout. According to the filmmaker, he 'wanted lots of movement and I wanted it to be throughout the whole picture, and I wanted the style to kind of break down by the end, so that by Henry's last day as a wiseguy, it's as if the whole picture would be out of control, give the impression he's just going to spin off the edge and fly out.' He claims that the film's style comes from the first two or three minutes of (1962): extensive narration, quick edits, and multiple locale switches. It was this reckless attitude towards convention that mirrored the attitude of many of the gangsters in the film. Scorsese remarked, 'So if you do the movie, you say, 'I don't care if there's too much narration. Too many quick cuts?—That's too bad.' It's that kind of really punk attitude we're trying to show'.
He adopted a frenetic style to almost overwhelm the audience with images and information. He also put plenty of detail in every frame because the gangster life is so rich. The use of freeze frames was done because Scorsese wanted images that would stop 'because a point was being reached' in Henry's life. Didn't judge his character but found the scene where he kills Spider for talking back to his character hard to do, because he had trouble justifying the action until he forced himself to feel the way Tommy did. Lorraine Bracco found the shoot to be an emotionally difficult one because it was such a male-dominated cast, and she realized if she did not make her 'work important, it would probably end up on the cutting room floor'. When it came to the relationship between Henry and Karen, Bracco saw no difference between an abused wife and her character.
According to Pesci, improvisation and ad-libbing came out of rehearsals wherein Scorsese let the actors do whatever they wanted. He made transcripts of these sessions, took the lines the actors came up with that he liked best, and put them into a revised script that the cast worked from during principal photography. For example, the scene where Tommy tells a story and Henry is responding to him — the 'Funny how? Do I amuse you?'
Scene — is based on an actual event that Pesci had witnessed. It was worked on in rehearsals where he and Liotta improvised, and Scorsese recorded four to five takes, rewrote their dialogue, and inserted it into the script. The dinner scene with Tommy's mother was largely improvised. Her painting of the bearded man with the dogs was based on a photograph from magazine.
The cast did not meet during the film's shoot until a few weeks before it premiered. Liotta met him in an undisclosed city; Hill had seen the film and told the actor that he loved it.
The long tracking shot through the Copacabana nightclub came about because of a practical problem: the filmmakers could not get permission to go in the short way, and this forced them to go round the back. Scorsese decided to film the sequence in one unbroken shot in order to symbolize that Henry's entire life was ahead of him, commenting, 'It's his seduction of her Karen and it's also the lifestyle seducing him'.
This sequence was shot eight times. Henry's last day as a wiseguy was the hardest part of the film for Scorsese to shoot, because he wanted to properly show Henry's state of anxiety, paranoia, and racing thoughts caused by and intoxication. Scorsese said to movie critic in an interview the reason for Pesci shooting at the screen at the end of the film: 'well that's a reference right to the end of, that's the way that ends, that film, and basically the plot of this picture is very similar to The Great Train Robbery. It hasn't changed, 90 years later, it's the same story, the gun shots will always be there, he's always going to look behind his back, he's gotta have eyes behind his back, because they're gonna get him someday.'
The director ended the film with Henry regretting that he is no longer a wiseguy, about which Scorsese said, 'I think the audience should get angry at him and I would hope they do—and maybe with the system which allows this.' Post-production Scorsese wanted to depict the film's violence realistically, 'cold, unfeeling and horrible. Almost incidental'.
However, he had to remove 10 frames of blood to ensure an from the. With a budget of $25 million, Goodfellas was Scorsese's most expensive film to date but still only a medium budget by Hollywood standards. It was also the first time he was obliged by Warner Bros. To preview the film. It was shown twice in California, and a lot of audiences were 'agitated' by Henry's last day as a wise guy sequence.
Scorsese argued that that was the point of the scene. Scorsese and the film's editor, made this sequence faster with more jump cuts to convey Henry's drug-addled point of view. In the first test screening there were 40 walkouts in the first ten minutes. One of the favorite scenes for test audiences was the one where Tommy tells the story and Henry is responding to him—the 'Do I amuse you?' Soundtrack. Main article: While there is no incidental score as such in the film, Scorsese chose songs for the soundtrack that he felt obliquely commented on the scene or the characters.
He only used music that could have been heard at that time. For example, if a scene took place in 1973, he could use any song that was current or older. According to Scorsese, a lot of non-dialogue scenes were shot to playback. For example, he had ' (1970) playing on the set while shooting the scene where the dead bodies are discovered in the car, dumpster, and meat truck. Sometimes, the lyrics of songs were put between lines of dialogue to comment on the action.
Some of the music Scorsese had written into the script, while other songs he discovered during the editing phase. Release and reception Distribution Goodfellas premiered at the, where Scorsese received the award for. It was given a wide release in North America on September 21, 1990 in 1,070 theaters with an opening weekend gross of 6.3 million. It went on to make $46.8 million domestically.
Critical response On, a, 96% of 91 surveyed critics gave the film a positive review; the average rating was 9/10. The site's critical consensus reads, 'Hard-hitting and stylish, GoodFellas is a gangster classic – and arguably the high point of Martin Scorsese's career.'
Gave the film a weighted average score of 89 out of 100 based on 18 critics, indicating 'universal acclaim'. On, audiences gave the film an average grade of 'A–' on an A+ to F scale. In his review for the, wrote, 'No finer film has ever been made about organized crime – not even The Godfather.'
In his review for the, wrote, 'All of the performances are first-rate; Pesci stands out, though, with his seemingly unscripted manner. GoodFellas is easily one of the year's best films.'
In his review for, wrote, 'More than any earlier Scorsese film, Goodfellas is memorable for the ensemble nature of the performances. The movie has been beautifully cast from the leading roles to the bits. There is flash also in some of Mr. Scorsese's directorial choices, including freeze frames, and the occasional long tracking shot. None of it is superfluous'. Gave the film four out of four stars and called it, 'great cinema—and also a whopping good time'., in his review for magazine, wrote 'Every crisp minute of this long, teeming movie vibrates with outlaw energy'.
Said, 'Big, Rich, Powerful and Explosive. One of Scorsese's best films! Goodfellas is great entertainment.' Reed, Rex (24 September 1990).
New York Magazine. In his review for, wrote, 'So it is Scorsese's triumph that GoodFellas offers the fastest, sharpest 2½-hr. Ride in recent film history.' Lists The film was ranked the best of 1990 by Roger Ebert, Gene Siskel, and Peter Travers. In 2012, the listed Goodfellas as the fifteenth best-edited film of all time based on a survey of its membership. Goodfellas is 39th on 's 2014 list of the top 100 Films.
September 17, 1990. Retrieved October 22, 2015. 'Scorsese on Scorsese'. Box Office Mojo. Retrieved December 7, 2014. Merrie, Stephanie (April 29, 2015).
The Washington Post. Retrieved March 12, 2017. Vlastelica, Ryan (September 18, 2015).
^ Malcolm, Derek (September–October 1990). ^ Goodwin, Richard. 'The Making of Goodfellas'. ^ Linfield, Susan (September 16, 1990). ^ Clark, Mike (September 19, 1990).
' GoodFellas step from his childhood'. ^ Kelly, Mary Pat (March 2003). 'Martin Scorsese: A Journey'.
Thunder Mouth Press. Empire Magazine. November 1990. Retrieved 5 June 2015. ^ Gilbert, Matthew (September 16, 1990).
'Scorsese Tackles the Mob'. ^ Hughes, Howard. Crime Wave: The Filmgoers' Guide to the Great Crime Movies. Portman, Jamie (October 1, 1990).
' Goodfellas Star Prefers Quiet Life'. ^ Arnold, Gary (September 25, 1990).
Witchel, Alex (September 27, 1990). 'A Mafia Wife Makes Lorraine Bracco a Princess'.
Van Gelder, Lawrence (October 12, 1990). 'At the Movies'.
^ Kaplan, Jonah (writer and editor); Stephen Altobellow and Jeffrey Schwartz (producers) (2004). Getting Made: The Making of Goodfellas. Goodfellas (Blu-ray Disc) format= requires url=. Godfrey, Alex (November 2013).
Malcolm, Derek (September 17, 1990). 'The Venice Film Festival ends in uproar'. The Guardian. Retrieved November 8, 2018. Retrieved 2014-10-18. Archived from on 2015-04-05.
Canby, Vincent (September 19, 1990). 'A Cold-Eyed Look at the Mob's Inner Workings'. Ansen, David (September 17, 1990). 'A Hollywood Crime Wave'. Corliss, Richard (September 24, 1990).
Archived from on August 8, 2007. Retrieved March 26, 2008. December 2002. Archived from on March 12, 2012. Retrieved August 27, 2008. Schickel, Richard (February 12, 2005).
Retrieved 2009-01-29. Retrieved 2008-12-02. October 25, 2005.
Archived from on March 17, 2008. Retrieved March 26, 2008. Retrieved 2008-12-02. Retrieved December 6, 2013.
July 24, 2010. Archived from on July 24, 2011.
Retrieved October 9, 2010. Andreeva, Nellie (January 10, 2012). Retrieved January 16, 2012.
Bibbiani, William (September 11, 2013). Retrieved May 7, 2015. Cox, Gordon. Retrieved 18 March 2015. Bibliography.
Kelly, Mary Pat (2003). Martin Scorsese: A Journey. Thunder Mouth Press. Pileggi, Nicholas; Scorsese, Martin (1990).
Faber and Faber. Pileggi, Nicholas (1990). Thompson, David; Christie, Ian (2004). Scorsese on Scorsese. External links Wikiquote has quotations related to:. October 2010.
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Goodfellas (stylized as GoodFellas) is a 1990 American directed. It is a of the 1986 non-fiction book by, who co-wrote the screenplay with Scorsese. The film narrates the rise and fall of mob associate (the in the film) and his friends over a period from 1955 to 1980. Scorsese initially named the film Wise Guy and postponed making it; later, he and Pileggi changed the name to Goodfellas. To prepare for their roles in the film, and often spoke with Pileggi, who shared research material left over from writing the book. According to Pesci, improvisation and ad-libbing came out of rehearsals wherein Scorsese gave the actors freedom to do whatever they wanted.
The director made transcripts of these sessions, took the lines he liked best, and put them into a revised script, which the cast worked from during principal photography. Made on a budget of $25 million, Goodfellas grossed $46.8 million domestically.
It received positive reviews from critics and was nominated for six, including and, and it won for Pesci in the category. Scorsese's film won five awards from the, including.
Additionally, Goodfellas was named Best Film of the year by various film critics groups. Goodfellas is often regarded as one of the, both in the crime genre and in general. The film ranks #6 on 's 2008 list of the 500 greatest movies of all time. In 2000, the film was deemed 'culturally, historically, and aesthetically significant' and selected for preservation in the by the United States.
Its content and style have been emulated in numerous other films and television shows. Scorsese followed this film with two more about organized crime: and. Contents Plot says, 'As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster', referring to his idolization of gangsters in his 1950s, predominantly neighborhood in. Wanting to be part of something significant, Henry quits school and goes to work for them. He is able to make a living for himself and learns the two most important lessons in life: 'Never rat on your friends, and always keep your mouth shut', the advice given to him after being acquitted of criminal charges early in his career. Henry is taken under the wing of local mob leader, Paul 'Paulie' Cicero and his associates:, who loves hijacking trucks; and Tommy DeVito, an aggressive armed robber with a temper.
In late 1967, they commit the. Enjoying the perks of their criminal life, they spend most of their nights at the carousing with women. Henry meets and later marries Karen, a Jewish woman from the area of.
Karen is initially troubled by Henry's criminal activities but is soon seduced by his glamorous lifestyle. On June 11, 1970, Billy Batts, a mobster in the Gambino Crime Family, insults Tommy about being a shoeshine boy in his younger days. Enraged, Tommy and Jimmy attack and kill him.
Knowing their murder of a member would mean retribution from the Gambino crime family, which could possibly include Paulie himself being ordered to kill them, Jimmy, Henry, and Tommy cover up the murder. They transport the body in the trunk of Henry's car and bury it upstate. Six months later, Jimmy learns the burial site will be developed, forcing them to exhume the decomposing corpse and move it. Henry sets up his mistress, Janice Rossi, in an apartment. When Karen finds out about their relationship, she tries to confront Janice at the apartment building and then threatens Henry at gunpoint at home. Henry goes to live in the apartment with Janice, but Paulie mediates and directs him to return to Karen after completing a job for him; Henry and Jimmy are sent to collect from an indebted gambler in Florida. However, they are arrested after being turned in by the gambler's sister, a typist for the.
Jimmy and Henry receive ten-year prison sentences. In prison, Henry sells drugs smuggled in by Karen to support his family on the outside. After his early release in 1978, Henry further establishes himself in the drug trade, ignoring Paulie's ban on drug trafficking, and convinces Tommy and Jimmy to join him. Jimmy and a lot of Henry's associates commit the at, stealing $6 million. However, after a few members buy expensive items and the getaway car is found by police, Jimmy has most of the crew killed. Tommy is eventually killed in retribution for Batts' murder, having been fooled into thinking he would become a. By May 11, 1980, Henry is a nervous wreck from cocaine use and insomnia.
He tries to organize a drug deal with his associates in, however he is arrested by narcotics agents and jailed. After being bailed out, Karen tells him she flushed $60,000 worth of cocaine down the toilet to prevent FBI agents from finding it during their raid, leaving the family virtually penniless. Feeling betrayed by Henry's dealing drugs, Paulie gives him $3,200 and ends any association with him. Facing federal charges, and realizing Jimmy plans to have him killed, Henry decides to enroll in the. He gives sufficient testimony to have Paulie and Jimmy arrested and convicted.
Forced out of his gangster life, Henry now has to face living in the real world. He narrates: 'I'm an average nobody.
I get to live the rest of my life like a '. Subtitles explain that Henry was subsequently arrested on drug charges in, Washington, but has been clean since 1987.
He and Karen separated in 1989 after twenty five years of marriage. Paul Cicero died in of respiratory illness in 1988 at age 73. Jimmy, in 1990, was serving a twenty-year-to-life sentence in a New York State prison.