𝙿𝚊𝚘𝚕𝚘 𝙼𝚊𝚌𝙶𝚞𝚏𝚏𝚒𝚗 | 🇮🇹’s review published on Letterboxd:
«As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster». GoodFellas is inspired by Henry Hill's true story within the Mafia, from his beginnings as a petty criminal to his involvement in increasingly important and dangerous illegal activities. Based on the novel Wiseguy by Nicholas Pileggi, the film is the chronicle, not devoid of unusual black humor, of the evolution of Italian-American organized crime narrated from the perspective of an individual who has been an integral part of it for almost thirty years. This synergistic combination of action and irony deprives the story of that epic aura typical of the mafia-movies of the past, giving Martin Scorsese the opportunity to describe the brutal context of a world constantly outside the law, without ever falling into any moralism.
The narration develops in a chronologically discontinuous and fragmented way, with repeated temporal leaps and changes of perspective, giving life to a fragmented but compelling plot. The staging is very accurate, centered on a finely stylized direction that juggles between sinuous sequence shots, suggestive slow-motion and ironic still images, which is accompanied by a fast-paced editing, a skilful use of the narrative voice and a soundtrack that constitutes a real own musical treasure of the time. The film also stands out for the extraordinary skill of the cast, made up of actors of the caliber of Ray Liotta, Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci, who manage to flawlessly represent the absurdity of a harsh and violent reality, but which at the same time is permeated by bonds of friendship and solidarity, in which honor and loyalty are considered sacred values.
