Has one of the most diverse filmographies, his longevity is unmatched, has made at least one classic each decade since the 70s, and even his mediocre films have soul.
Has one of the most diverse filmographies, his longevity is unmatched, has made at least one classic each decade since the 70s, and even his mediocre films have soul.
Have you seen Il traditore, by Marco Bellocchio? It's a great film, about the internal war in the Sicilian mafia of the 1980s. Very beatifully shot, but as factual as a documentary.
There was one scene near the end where I thought the director had maybe taken some liberties, when the informer Tommaso Buscetta confronts Toto Riina - probably the greatest butcher the mafia has known, responsible for the death of 100s, maybe 1000s - in the courtroom. Buscetta accuses Riina of being responsible for the destruction of the Cosa Nostra, not informers, or cops, or the justice system - and Riina just sits there laughing.
I wondered if that really had happened, so I looked it up, and not only did it happen, it's on YouTube:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=K2cKJ0foc3E&t=3m20s
I will say, one big difference I’ve noticed between Italian Americans and Italian, the former idolizes the mafia, the latter almost never has anything good to say about them. I’ve seen that reflected in film too, every Italian film concerning the mob I’ve seen presented them in a totally dark unflattering tone. Scorsese is better than most but even he can’t avoid romanticizing them a little
Absolutely, like the scene when they cook dinner in prison in Goodfellas, Scorsese clearly loves that part of their world.
I think it is just unfortunately the fact that the mafia is really ingrained as a feature of Italian American culture, it’s hard to separate from it. What we see in Goodfellas is the truth, your average mafia enforcer wasn’t some noble tuxedo wearing gentleman but coked up thugs who’d shoot teenagers in the leg while drunk, and then shoot them to death when said teenager expressed unhappiness about getting shot in the leg. But I think the issue is for a lot of early Italian American communities affiliation with the mod was one of their only means of upward mobility. My current partner is Italian American and she openly admits her family’s success partly comes from the fact her grandpa started a mod supported business (he owned like 6 dry cleaners in PA).
I think he definitely romanticized the “family” aspect for sure. Cool guys cooking and cracking jokes together. It always falls apart at the end though showing how fragile and fake their “family” is.