As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster.
Martin Scorsese's famous 1990 film, which followed the story of New York City gangster Henry Hill (Ray Liotta) from his induction into the Lucchese crime family in the 1950s to his downfall and entry into the Witness Protection Program in the 1980s. Along with Henry, the film follows Henry's boss Jimmy Conway (Robert De Niro), his best friend Tommy DeVito (Joe Pesci), and his wife Karen (Lorraine Bracco), while detailing Henry's moving up the ranks, his eventual imprisonment, his role in the largest heist in American history to date, and his involvement with the cocaine trade, which eventually gets him arrested by narcotics officers and shunned by the Mob; as the ground crumbles around him, he turns to the Feds for protection, eventually having to "live the rest of [his] life like a shnook".
The movie became famous for several reasons, including a long tracking shot through the kitchen of the Copacabana; the montage near the end showing Henry's increasing drug-induced paranoia as he tries to run some guns, get a drug shipment off to Pittsburgh, and make dinner for his family; and Tommy's
profanity-laden dialogue and
dangerously short temper, which threatened to make
Joe Pesci typecast for some time — and won him the Best Supporting Actor Oscar. The movie itself ended up losing Best Picture to
Dances With Wolves.
Goodfellas was followed by
Casino, a near-remake also featuring De Niro (who 'fagocitated' Liotta's role in becoming the centre of the movie's romantic subplot) and Pesci (still his same vicious, cynical charachter).
Goodfellas provides examples of the following tropes:
- Ax Crazy: Tommy, and to a lesser extent Jimmy.
- Berserk Button: Tommy De Vito may be the original Pesci with a Berserk Keyboard, but special mention must go to made man Billy Batts bringing up Tommy's humiliating past as a shoe-shine boy and then telling him to "go home and get yer fuckin' shine box," which pisses Tommy off enough that he pounds Batts to a bloody pulp, and later stabs him and shoots him full of lead just make sure he's dead. This would later get Tommy himself killed, because you do not kill a made man without a sitdown and an okay from the boss.
- Big Applesauce: All of the movie was shot in (and takes place in) New York City and environs. In a twist, we barely see the stereotypical Manhattan sights as most of the movie's action happens in Queens near JFK Airport.
- Black And Gray Morality: It's a movie about gangsters, what did you expect?
- Black Comedy
- Cluster F Bomb: Tommy, in what became a career-defining role (to some people) for Joe Pesci.
- Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangster: Although the film was part deconstruction of that.
- Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: Tommy De Vito.
- Gallows Humor: Quite a bit, most notably the grave digging scene.
- Glory Days: How Henry looks at his old life.
- Heroic Sociopath: Pretty much the whole mob, but most particularly Tommy and Jimmy.
- Hookers And Blow
- I Just Shot Marvin In The Face: Played straight by Tommy, then subverted when he intentionally kills Spider.
- Jerk Ass: Tommy DeVito to the point of being a sociopath.
- Jumping Off The Slippery Slope: Henry joins the gang because he thinks they're cool. Later he cheats on his wife, hits his wife, uses cocaine, deals cocaine, uses/deals cocaine against the direct orders of the Mafia head, and basically destroys everything that he could have had in a normal life.
- Not Using The Z Word: Ala The Godfather, the word "mafia" is rarely, if at all used.
- Little No: Tommy, as he realizes he's about to get whacked. He doesn't even finish saying it.
- The Mafia
- The Napoleon: Tommy, oh God, Tommy.
- One Steve Limit: Averted during the wedding scene. "Seems like all of them were named Peter or Paul, and they were all married to a Marie."
- The Pesci: There's a reason the roles he plays in this and Casino are the Trope Namers.
- Thou Shalt Not Kill: In a movie about gangsters, the main character Henry does not kill anyone. Not a soul. He buries bodies, steals things, beats people to a pulp, but he doesn't kill anyone.
- Pistol Whipping: By the main character.
- Pretty In Mink: Some of the wives wear fur, although the fact that they were either stolen or bought with stolen money makes this overlap with Fur And Loathing.
- Samuel L Jackson: In a bit part (this movie was four years before Pulp Fiction after all...) of the negro guitar player who gets involved in the great Lufthansa heist: unfortunately, he gets killed by Tommy and Joe Carbone for not having disposed of the van used in the heist as he was told to do. His death probably sends Jimmy Conway on the course of just killing off all of the heist accomplices (aside from Tommy and Henry) to keep most of the money for himself.
- So Cool Its Awesome: Considered one of the quintessential mob films, reportedly by gangsters themselves.
- Soundtrack Dissonance: And how!
- There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Billy Bats is bleeding in the trunk, but he's still alive. So Tommy stabs him eight times. Then Jimmy goes ahead by shooting him four times. And then the title screen comes in.
- Trigger Happy: Tommy
- Villain Protagonist
- What An Idiot: His bosses want to put a hit on Henry at the end because they are worried he'll squeal to the cops. It's the knowledge that he has a hit on him that makes Henry squeal.
- Witness Protection
