Joe Pesci Movie:

Editorial Review:
Martin Scorsese's 1990 masterpiece GoodFellasimmortalizes the hilarious, horrifying life of actual gangster Henry Hill (Ray Liotta), from his teen years on the streets of New York to his anonymous exile under the Witness Protection Program. The director's kinetic style is perfect for recounting Hill's ruthless rise to power in the 1950s as well as his drugged-out fall in the late 1970s; in fact, no one has ever rendered the mental dislocation of cocaine better than Scorsese. Scorsese uses period music perfectly, not just to summon a particular time but to set a precise mood. GoodFellas is at least as good as The Godfather without being in the least derivative of it. Joe Pesci's psycho improvisation of Mobster Tommy DeVito ignited Pesci as a star, Lorraine Bracco scores the performance of her life as the love of Hill's life, and every supporting role, from Paul Sorvino to Robert De Niro, is a miracle.

GoodFellas [Region 2] Reviews:
The best mobster movie ever made
2009-11-07 - This is the second time around for this film on Blu. This edition will have the following extra features:

1.A 34-page booklet and on the discs themselves:
2. Martin Scorsese commentary track where he is joined by various cast and crew including Ray Liotta, Paul Sorvino and Nicholas Pileggi.
3. Henry Hill and FBI Agent Edward McDonald commentary.
4. Getting Made, Made Men and The Workaday Gangster making-of documentaries.
The above are all to be found on the two-disc Special Edition DVD and the recent Blu-ray.
They will be joined by:
5. Public Enemies: The Golden Age of the Gangster Film documentary - 106 minutes.
6.Four Warner Bros. mob-themed cartoons.

The documentary on the gangster film is already available separately here - Public Enemies - The Golden Age of the Gangster Film and in the boxed set Warner Gangsters Collection, Vol. 4 (The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse / Invisible Stripes / Kid Galahad / Larceny, Inc. / The Little Giant / Public Enemies: The Golden Age of the Gangster Film).

So if you have the documentary and you have the original Blu version you are getting nothing extra in this version.

As for the film itself, After you see this movie, all other mobster movies you see or ever have seen will seem like garbage. They and their cast of characters will all appear cartoonish in comparison. Of course, this is a movie about the mafia from the working man/gangster point of view, where "The Godfather" was a mafia movie filmed from the viewpoint of the executive suite, so there really is no valid comparison there. "Goodfellas" really does seem ahead of its time when you realize that the only artistic work about the mafia that compares to it in quality is the HBO series "The Sopranos", which debuted nine years after this movie was made. "Goodfellas" tells the real-life story of mobster Henry Hill, and it is largely true, although there are individual scenes that are out of sequence and others that were added for dramatic effect, such as Karen Hill flushing the coca ine down the toilet during the drug bust. Also, Tommy, the character that Joe Pesci played and the part for which he won an Oscar, was actually a composite of two separate gangsters. Other details are omitted completely, probably because they would have spun the movie off in too many different directions. For example, crime boss "Big Paulie" actually was having an affair with Henry Hill's wife, Karen. When Tommy tried to assault her and Paulie found out, that was when he alerted the Gambinos to the fact that Tommy had killed their missing crew member, "made man" Billy Batts, nine years earlier. This is the true reason that it took so long for Tommy to be killed over that incident. Thus, masterful direction of the story by Martin Scorsese in what was probably his finest film is why the audience has a more cohesive view of the mobsters portrayed in this movie than if we had been told every last detail.

What really makes this movie great is all of the personal details that enable you to see these mobsters living a largely suburban life, concerned about kids' birthday parties and getting the sauce just right for dinner, and all the while completely immersed in a completely amoral lifestyle in which murder and bribes solve everything- a lifestyle to which they would never voluntarily choose an alternative.

The film I recommend as one of the classics, but as for this version, if you have the Blu version already and you have the documentary on the gangster film, I can't see putting out this kind of money for four mobster related cartoons.

Film - 5/5
Extra features 2/5 (nothing we haven't seen before)
Averaged together = 3.5 stars

I round up from 3.5 to 4 stars just out of respect for the film.

goodfellas
2009-11-01 - awsome gangster movie!! a true story about the mob told by a gangster. from growing up and joining to leaving it in the end. ray,joe and robert are awsome in the movie!! its a longmovie on a two sided disk!!

Classic lines from a Scorcese Masterpiece
2009-10-30 - I really can't put into words how I feel about this film. A Scorcese masterpiece (for which they robbed him of Oscar), it juxtaposes, (the same way the Sopranos did later on), the real life family struggles mobsters deal with.......with their "jobs". Add to that the masterfully written dialogue, which incidentally has provided years and years of fodder for my family, and you have a film of monumental proportions---"Henry....you gotta go back to Karen.....you're not gonna get a divorce...we're not animale"....Genius! Genius!

Classic
2009-10-14 - Next to The Godfather 1 and 2 this is the best mafia flick ever made.

Awesome Movie
2009-10-14 - This has to be one of the greatest mob movies i've ever seen. this movie rocks. robert dr niro is an outstanding actor. pretty much if he's in it it's going to be good. this is a must see movie