Goodfellas

Based on the book Wiseguy by Nicholas Pileggi, Goodfellas is the story of mob associate Henry Hill who is part of a crew as they would rise high and later fall low once he gets himself in trouble and become a target by his own crew. Directed by Martin Scorsese and screenplay by Scorsese and Pileggi, the film is a dramatization of Hill’s life as he lived a life of luxury as part of the mob while watching his world fall apart through his own faults and everything else as he is portrayed by Ray Liotta. Also starring Robert de Niro, Joe Pesci, Lorraine Bracco, and Paul Sorvino. Goodfellas is an exhilarating and wild film from Martin Scorsese.

Spanning nearly three decades, the film follows the life of a young man who becomes an associate for a mob boss doing small things and later rising up the ranks as a wise guy where he gets involved with a lot of things and live a nice life only to fall big through his own faults and other activities. It’s a film with a simple rise-and-fall scenario from screenwriters Martin Scorsese and Nicholas Pileggi where Henry Hill was this teenager who is fascinated by the local mob in his neighborhood as he offers to help them and manages to win their respect and trust. The script is largely told from Hill’s perspective as he worked for the mob boss Paulie Cicero (Paul Sorvino) and later befriends a truck hijacker in Jimmy Conway (Robert de Niro) and a fellow juvenile delinquent in Tommy DeVito (Joe Pesci). The first act is about Hill’s young life as he would befriend Cicero and become part of his crew doing small favors and such where he would meet Conway and DeVito. It is also the moment he meets Karen (Lorraine Bracco) would become his wife as she would also have some voice-over narration as it relates to her experience being the wife of a wise guy.

The film’s second act begins in 1970 as it relates to a violent encounter with the Gambino family member Billy Batts (Frank Vincent) over an insult he made towards DeVito. It would lead to all sorts of things relating to Hill’s own affairs with other women, a brief incarceration in prison during the 70s, the Lufthansa vault heist that was organized by Morrie Kessler (Chuck Low), and drugs. It all play into this lifestyle of getting whatever you want and be given special privileges that allow them to get away with what they want but also manage to get some things in prison that would make their stay more comfortable. The second act both begins and ends with a major death as it would lead to this third act that is the fall of Hill and his friends. Notably as it play into the severity of Hill’s drug problems and other aspects in the business that would eventually get him in trouble.

Martin Scorsese’s direction definitely has a flair for style from the opening credits sequence designed by Saul Bass as well as the way the film opens with Hill, Conway, and DeVito driving onto a highway as they hear something bumping in the trunk as it would relate to an incident during the film’s second act. Much of the film is shot on various locations in New York, New Jersey, and parts of Long Island in New York as it play into this culture of Italian-Americans, Irish-Americans, and Jewish-Italian Americans who are part of this world that is working-class but these wise guys live a life that can get them whatever they want. There are some wide shots that Scorsese would use to get a scope of the locations yet much of his direction emphasizes on close-ups and medium shots. Even as Scorsese would use these intricate tracking shots to play into some locations such as a nightclub along with some stylistic shots that play into the violence and drama. Scorsese also infuse elements of humor as it relates to DeVito and the stories he tells as well as his own violent outbursts after he shoots someone who wouldn’t take shit from him.

The Billy Batts scene is one filled with dark humor and some confrontational dialogue that would be followed by a comical moment at the home of DeVito’s mother (Catherine Scorsese) as she, her son, Conway, and Hill eat breakfast as it play into Scorsese’s offbeat tone as Scorsese would focus some attention on the car knowing something is up. The scenes of decadence and excess are heightened that includes this fiery sequence early in the third act where Hill’s cocaine addiction finally catches up with him as he believes someone is watching him with shots of helicopters and all sorts of things. Scorsese also play into this sense of drama that looms during the third act as well as some moments late in the second act that relates to Lufthansa and the players involved where there is a melancholia that would be prominent into its third act and what happens in the end. Overall, Scorsese creates a riveting yet outrageous film about the life of a mob hood and the craziness he endures as part of a crew.

Cinematographer Michael Ballhaus does brilliant work with the film’s cinematography where Ballhaus maintains a straightforward look for many of the daytime exterior scenes along with some stylish lights for some scenes set at night. Editor Thelma Schoonmaker does incredible work with the editing with its stylish usage of freeze-frames, slow-motion shots, jump-cuts, and other stylistic editing techniques as it help play into the action and suspense as it is one of the film’s major highlights. Production designer Kristi Zea, with set decorator Leslie Bloom and art director Maher Ahmad, does excellent work with the look of the homes that Hill lived in as well as the homes of friends and the places he, Conway, and DeVito go to as well as the prison cell he and Cicero shared.

Costume designer Richard Bruno does fantastic work with the costumes from the stylish suits the men wear as well as the clothes and fur coats the women wear to play into the evolving period of the times. Sound editor Skip Lievsay does amazing work with the sound in the way sound effects are presented as well as gunfire, the atmosphere of a club or a restaurant, and other textures as it play into the suspense and drama as it’s a highlight of the film. The film’s tremendous music soundtrack is a highlight of the film as it help play into the evolving period of the times as well as some of the craziness that occurs as it features contributions from Tony Bennett, the Moonglows, the Cadillacs, Billy Ward and His Dominoes, the Chantels, the Harptones, Otis Williams and the Charms, Mina, Johnny Mathis, Aretha Franklin, Bobby Darin, the Rolling Stones, Harry Nilsson, Derek and the Dominos, Muddy Waters, Cream, the Shangri-Las, Bobby Vinton, Betty Curtis, the Crystals, Dean Martin, Donovan, the Who, George Harrison, and Sid Vicious.

The casting by Ellen Lewis is great as it feature some notable small roles and appearances from Tony Sirico as a member of Cicero’s gang in Tony Stacks, Michael Imperioli as a young man handing out drinks during a poker game in Spider, Mike Starr as a trucker friend of Conway in Frenchy, Frank Sivero as an associate of Conway in Frankie Carbone, Samuel L. Jackson as a musician/trucker named Stacks who was part of the Lufthansa heist, Catherine Scorsese as DeVito’s mother, Charles Scorsese as one of Cicero’s cellmates in Vinnie who likes to put a lot of onions in the tomato sauce, Gina Mastrogiacomo as one of Hill’s mistresses in Janice Rossi, Welker White as the Hills’ babysitter Lois who also does drug deal for them, Debi Mazar as another of Hill’s mistress in Sandy who would help him with the cocaine, Illeana Douglas as a mob girlfriend in Rosie, Joseph D’Onofrio as the young Tommy, Christopher Sirrone as the young Henry, Margo Winkler as Morrie’s wife, Vincent Pastore as a coatrack man, Kevin Corrigan as Henry’s younger brother Michael, and Chuck Low as the salesman Morrie Kessler who helps organize the Lufthansa heist.

Frank Vincent is brilliant in his one-scene performance as Billy Batts as a revered mob figure who insults DeVito at a bar on the night he returns to Jersey as he is just trying to have fun and relax. Paul Sorvino is fantastic as Paulie Cicero as a mob boss who is trying to run his crew as he also ensures that Hill gets his shit together while they also share a prison cell together while disapproving about Hill’s fascination with drugs. Lorraine Bracco is excellent as Karen as Hill’s wife who meets him at a blind date and then confronts him when he stands her up for a second date as she becomes bewildered by the mob culture yet also enjoys the lifestyle and its perks only to realize the dangers of the lifestyle that includes a terrible cocaine addiction.

Joe Pesci is marvelous as Tommy DeVito as a fast-talking, confrontational mob figure who says a lot of shit but has a short fuse where he can get really violent as it’s Pesci being extremely funny but also scary at times as it’s really one of his most iconic performances. Robert de Niro is remarkable as Jimmy Conway as a mob hood who works for Cicero yet is someone who can get things done and make more money while running small operations including the Lufthansa heist as he helped run that heist and ensure that no one gets way over their heads with the success of the heist. Finally, there’s Ray Liotta in a phenomenal performance as Henry Hill as a Jewish-Italian man who becomes fascinated by the world of the wise guys as a kid as he later becomes a man that gets things done but never kills anyone yet doesn’t mind giving someone beatings or live a good life only to endure a terrible cocaine addiction as it’s Liotta displaying a ferocity and vulnerability as a man who puts himself and his family in great danger only to realize what he must do to save himself but a terrible price.

Goodfellas is a magnificent film from Martin Scorsese. Featuring a great ensemble cast, a compelling rise-and-fall story, striking visuals, top-notch editing, and gripping music soundtrack. It's a film that explores the life of a mob hood trying to live a lifestyle of excess and vast riches only to get caught up in some bad shit as it’s told in an offbeat yet exhilarating fashion. In the end, Goodfellas is an outstanding film from Martin Scorsese.

Martin Scorsese Films: (Who’s That Knocking on My Door?) – (Street Scenes) – Boxcar Bertha - (Mean Streets) – Italianamerican - Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore - Taxi Driver - New York, New York - American Boy: A Profile of Steven Prince - (The Last Waltz) – Raging Bull - The King of Comedy - After Hours - The Color of Money - The Last Temptation of Christ - New York Stories-Life Lessons - Cape Fear (1991 film) - The Age of Innocence (1993 film) - (A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies) – (Casino) – (Kundun) – (My Voyage to Italy) – Bringing Out the Dead - (The Blues-Feel Like Going Home) – Gangs of New York - (The Aviator) – No Direction Home - The Departed - Shine a Light - Shutter Island - (A Letter to Elia) – (Public Speaking) - George Harrison: Living in the Material World - Hugo - The Wolf of Wall Street - (The Fifty Year Argument) – The Silence (2016 film) - (The Irishman (2019 film)) - Killers of the Flower Moon - (An Afternoon with SCTV)

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Even Cowgirls Get the Blues

Originally Written and Posted at Epinions.com on 12/10/08 w/ Additional Edits.

After scoring a critical hit with 1991's My Own Private Idaho, that also became a hit in art-house film circuits, Gus Van Sant had become the leading voice of the emerging New Queer Cinema movement. Hoping to make a bid in going mainstream, Van Sant decided to make his first big-budgeted film that had the full financial backing and support of a major studio. For this project, Gus Van Sant turned to an obscure yet celebrated novel by Tom Robbins about a young woman with large thumbs who travels around the country while exploring free love and homosexuality. The novel entitled Even Cowgirls Get the Blues was beloved in the gay community that it comes as no surprise than to have Gus Van Sant to do the film. The resulting film would have repercussions for Gus Van Sant's career as he struggled to find mainstream acceptance.

Written for the screen and directed by Gus Van Sant, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues is a road film about a woman with large, mutated thumbs who travels around the country while trying to find love in a world that's rapidly changing. During this journey, she encounters many strange people while going through transformations politically and sexually. With the novelist Tom Robbins serving as narrator, the film explores Van Sant's themes of homosexuality and desperate love that echoes such earlier work as My Own Private Idaho and his 1985 debut film Mala Noche. Starring Uma Thurman, Lorraine Bracco, Noriyuki "Pat" Morita, Angie Dickinson, Keanu Reeves, John Hurt, Sean Young, Crispin Glover, Udo Kier, Buck Henry, Ken Kesey, Roseanne Barr, Ed Begley Jr., Carol Kane, Heather Graham, Lin Shaye, Edward James Olmos, Rain Phoenix, and in one of his final film appearances, River Phoenix in an un-credited role as Pilgrim. Even Cowgirls Get the Blues despite its efforts, is a messy, baffling, and incoherent film from Gus Van Sant.

Ever since she was a child, Sissy Hawkins (Uma Thurman) had always wondered what power her large, mutated thumbs had until the day she hitch-hiked herself into a car. By the early 1970s, Sissy is now a traveler who constantly goes on road journeys with her magic thumbs. Yet, she briefly had success as a model when she got called by her former boss known as the Countess (John Hurt), a transvestite, feminist hygiene product mogul. Traveling through New York City via riding on cars and trucks, Sissy meets the Countess who had hoped to have Sissy meet with Native American water-colorist Julian (Keanu Reeves). The meeting turned into a disaster after Julian had an asthma attack while Sissy got seduced by a couple of Julian's entourage in Howard (Crispin Glover) and Marie (Sean Young).

After that disastrous encounter where her thumbs her due to her anxieties, Sissy is sent on a modeling assignment to a ranch he owns that's ran by Miss Adrian (Angie Dickinson). Going to the ranch, Miss Adrian is dealing with the increasing control from a group of cowgirls led by Bonanza Jellybean (Rain Phoenix). Sissy finds herself attracted to Jellybean and her wild ways which included lesbianism. When the modeling job involves doing something involved with whooping cranes, it doesn't go well due to dueling factions between the Countess and the cowgirls that included the peyote-taking Dolores (Lorraine Bracco). Torn between her love for Jellybean and loyalty to the Countess, Sissy flees to the mountains where she meets a Japanese-American recluse named the Chink (Noriyuki "Pat" Morita). After her strange counter with the Chink, Sissy returns to New York where she had a falling out with the Countess.

Fearing that her thumbs has now caused trouble, she turns to her childhood doctor Dr. Dreyfus (Buck Henry) for help. What happened would change her persona while hearing about the revolt from the cowgirls as they're protecting the whooping cranes from the government. Joining the cowgirls, she helps them in their fight while discovering her own true identity for the first time in her life.

The film is about a young woman's journey to self-discovery yet, with its themes of feminism, social politics, and such. It gets lost in its translation from book to novel but then again, the book is considered to be too strange to be adapted. Robbins story of self-discovery is filled with a lot of characters that often are too eccentric for their own good. Yet, the fault is largely due to Gus Van Sant and his attempts to turn it into a film and the result is very messy. He brings a film where not much makes sense, a lot of it becomes very self-indulgent, and overly pretentious. While the film has themes about homosexuality that were explored in his earlier films. Not much ground is covered in this one because it's often overshadowed by its political leanings towards animal activism which doesn't have much depth either.

Another problem with the film is that with most adaptations, something is missing in the adaptation. The film in its original running time of two hours in its initial premiere at the 1993 Toronto Film Festival received an overwhelming negative response. Therefore, Van Sant and editor Curtiss Clayton were forced to cut thirty-minutes of the film for its official 1994 theatrical release. Yet, something got lost as it's clear that some appearances must've been cut from the original film along with characters who seem to have a much bigger impact. Therefore, if Van Sant was trying to improve the film by shortening it and to simplify the story. He didn't succeed as it's lost in its rambling, incoherent plot while Tom Robbins' narration doesn't really help things either. Some insert shots of Sissy fantasizing and such doesn't feel right and the end result overall is a messy film from Gus Van Sant.

The cinematography of John J. Campbell and Eric Alan Edwards, two of Van Sant's early, regular cinematographers create an interesting look in a lot of the film's exterior shots of sunlight and evening shots. Yet, in comparison to their previous work with My Own Private Idaho, it lacks the atmospheric quality of that film as well as other early Van Sant features. Despite its look, it isn't actually inspiring nor does the editing by Van Sant and Curtiss Clayton that really doesn't have much style with the exception of stock footage of flying whooping cranes. Production designer Missy Stewart along with set decorator Nina Bradford, and art director Dan Self do create an interesting look of the Rubber Road ranch as well as the New York City art scene.

Costume designer Beatrix Aruna Pasztor also does some interesting work with the costumes, notably the cowgirls with their chaps, hats, and shirts to have them look masculine in a cool way. Sound designer Kelley Baker does some nice work in the film's battle sequence and road scenes though it's nothing spectacular in comparison to Van Sant's other films. The film's score by k.d. lang and Ben Mink is a highlight with its smooth, country style score and mix with rock where lang was hot at the time as her score and soundtrack is actually one of the best things in the film.

The casting by Sharon Bialy, Debi Manwiller, and Richard Pagano is interesting but distracting due to its slew of appearances from actors that are really just strange cameos. Appearances from Roseanne as a fortune teller, Grace Zabriskie and Ken Kesey as Sissy's parents, William S. Burroughs as himself, Udo Kier as a commercial director, Edward James Olmos in an un-credited appearance as a musician in a barbeque, Lin Shaye as a ranch maid, Heather Graham and alt-folk musician Victoria Williams as a couple of cowgirls, Ed Begley, Jr. and Carol Kane along with Crispin Glover and Sean Young as Julian's snobby entourage, and the late River Phoenix in one of his final film appearances as a pilgrim. Keanu Reeves makes an extremely bad appearance as Julian with an awful tan to make himself look Native American while sporting an even more wooden performance where he has no clue what he's doing.

Buck Henry is good as a doctor who helps Sissy while Treva Jeffryes is also good as the young Sissy. John Hurt gives a strange, stylish, yet overbearing performance as the Countess with a Southern-British accent that doesn't work while at times, some of his physical performances don't really work. Angie Dickinson isn't very good either as Miss Adrian as she isn't given much to do but complain and act all shocked. Noriyuki "Pat" Morita is pretty good as the Chink, a recluse from the mountains who is very eccentric and fun despite his aversion to politics. Lorraine Bracco is good in a strange yet hilarious role as Dolores, a peyote-taking cowgirl who claims to have all of these weird, psychedelic visions. Rain Phoenix is somewhat decent though not overall brilliant as Bonanza Jellybean as while she is memorable. Her performance doesn't leave much of an impression as she's just there to talk in a drawl and look good in chaps.

Finally, there's Uma Thurman in one of her early leading roles. While it's not a bad performance, it's nothing worth celebrating either. While Thurman can portray being beautiful and naive while having this kind of drawl in her accent. There's not much she's given throughout the film despite being the lead character yet Thurman seems lost and unsure of what to do as the lead. Some of that fault can be due to Van Sant's direction though Thurman does manage to have some fine moments.

Despite its intentions, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues is a messy, incoherent failure from Gus Van Sant. While fans of Gus Van Sant might see this for their own interest, it's clear that this isn't one of his great films as he's already becoming one of cinema's premier directors. Yet, for all of his great films that he's made like Drugstore Cowboy, My Own Private Idaho, To Die For, Good Will Hunting, Elephant, Last Days, Paranoid Park, and more recently, Milk. Even Cowgirls Get the Blues is an interesting failure showing where someone as revered as Gus Van Sant can stumble. In the end, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues is a film that doesn't work despite Gus Van Sant's attempts to bring Tom Robbins' unique, eccentric cult novel to the big screen.

Gus Van Sant Films: Mala Noche - Drugstore Cowboy - My Own Private Idaho - To Die For - Good Will Hunting - Psycho (1998 film) - Finding Forrester - Gerry - Elephant - Last Days - Paranoid Park - Milk - (Restless)

The Shorts & Videos of Gus Van Sant - The Auteurs #4: Gus Van Sant

(C) thevoid99 2011