- In what ways does the book change as it gets translated from the book to the screen? We're going to discuss the ending of the book in class. Notice how Scorsese interprets the ending. We "break the fourth wall," a term from theater in which the actor begins speaking to the audience. What does this do in the context of the film?
- How does Scorsese use pop music in the film?
- What place does food play?
- The Lufthansa Heist is one of the heists of the century. Why does it happen off-stage in the film?
- Violence is the topic of this unit and it's a central part of the film. The opening, in fact, is what you might call ultra-violence. Is the film glorifying violence? Is it glorifying crime?
- Tommy (Joe Pesci) is a pretty awful person and Jimmy (Robert DeNiro) is not much better. But Henry is a mobster just like the other two. Why do we root for Henry and not the others? (Or am I wrong about who we're rooting for and who we're not?)
What other questions/comments do you have about the film and/or book?
I think the book ends in a funny and ironic way. Henry would speak down to hard working people and would basically make fun of them for the way they lived an ordinary life living paycheck to paycheck but at the end he ended up living the same way. After living a fabulous life with everything he could possibly have he ended up with nothing.
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ReplyDeleteIt is clear, at the end Henry does feel great about how his life. Has turned out. He is longing for the old life. He feels confined. This is a guy who is accustomed to freedom. So this transaction is hard for him.
I mean he doesn't feel great about his situation.
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ReplyDeleteit seems like the movie is glorifying violence. As Henry is the hero in the movie the audience unconsciously became sympathetic to him. And he was the one as well as Jimmy was the cool guys with violence portrayed in their mind. Tommy is violent and he shows it. On the other hand, Henry appears to be very calm and when it's time to act he is on top of his work. I felt more for Henry while reading the book until I reached his last monologue than the movie. In the movie, it just didn't feel right to see some people who care for their family destroy other's family in a moment. Henry was abusive to his wife in many ways while he shows his care for her at other moment. This sudden emotion change for me is nothing but "drama". Wise guys don't love anyone except themselves. There should be some disclaimer at the end of the movie that Henry's lifestyle or his thought is not appreciated because at the end of the day he is a criminal. Yes, we could forgive him if we could see him realizing his crime. We didn't see that. The only reason he helped the FBI is to save his family and his own life. He is not apologetic. He needed rehabilitation to understand human emotion. Because crime should never be justified. Everyone's life has value. For wise guys, only their family and their lives have worth something not any other's life. This is wrong.
ReplyDeleteThe writer purposefully put his attention to Henry because Henry was the one got caught by the police and happened to be helping them to find other wise guys.
ReplyDeleteHenry's intense desire to be a gangster refers to different people having different definitions of success in life.
ReplyDeleteActually, I love those thee (or maybe 4 including Paulie). They are a good trio, Henry, Jimmy, and Tommy. Tommy is always a mood maker. Jimmy is cool and really wise, like a leader of the group. Henry is smart, young, and well balanced. Henry has a capacity to bond these different characters and smoothen the relationship between those hard guys. Only the difference they have is "they are involved in crime", which is what ordinary people don't take. Violence, jail, and the content of the crime differentiate the three from the ordinary people. Therefore, Scorsese portrays the violent scene at the beginning of the film in order for the audience to easily differentiate the three from us. However, Scorsese's point is to depict the relationship between three in the community. And so, the detail of The Lufthansa Heist may not be necessary in the film.
ReplyDeleteThe ending of the film is actually sad. The environment surrounding them had been changed. Of course, lives change. The Lufthansa money makes Jimmy nuts. He keeps afraid that the cop roots it out and then starts killing his friends who were involved in the Lufthansa Heist. Criminal people is afraid of attacking people’s attention. What makes Henry nervous is the cop helicopter that chases his car. Everything has changed after the heist. It is ironical because they wanted to be the top wise guy and actually they did it- world record class robbery. And then, they get more attention from the cop, which they hate and changes their relationship.
This is a really good point, Koichi. Yes, the main characters ARE likable. I think we can notice this and still not approve of their anti-social behavior, their crimes, and other sociopathic tendencies. The problem, as Asma writes, is when we connect our liking of THEM to our liking of their CRIMES.
DeleteI think that the lufthansa heist was played back stage because it has not been solve yet. Also i believe because Henry was not involved in the lufthasan because he was not there. The movie focused on Henry. We may have been routing for Henry because if you think about it. He gave his while life to this and thought these people were his friends/family they were close. We didn't want to see him die.yez he put himself in this situation but it was the way of life he choose and no body deserves to die because somebody else wants them dead. Henry going to witness protection wasn't doing to solve all his issues because how was he going to just get up and leave all the things he did in his life behind. That is very hard. But he was asble to get a second chance. That I think he did deserve because everybody deserved another chance. What the do with that chance is up to them.
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ReplyDeleteto answer the question in the last bullet. i think the reason we root more for Henry is because he is not all that bad. unlike Tommy and Jimmy Henry shows some type of remorse for some of the people that have been hurt or been whacked. for example, When Jimmy wanted to whack Marty, because morris kept busting Jimmys balls about his money that he owed him from the Lufthansa hijack. He knew that Marty was a good guy and just like anyone else they want their money. Henry was trying to help marty out by warning him to stop busting jimmy balls every single day, just so Jimmy would kill him. even in the end he ended up whack him Henry still tried to save a life. and in other scenes you can see in henrys eyes that not everyone that died deserved to die.
ReplyDeleteI think the Lufthansa wasn't shown in the movie because it wasn't solved. in the book they had suspicions or proof on who committed the crime but no hard evidence on who actually did it. that also went on for a while.
This is a really good point, Rhonda. I think a lot of modern stories deal w/ terrible people (The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, etc.) who we're supposed to root for. Usually, those terrible people have enemies who are even more terrible. So in Breaking Bad, for instance, you have Walter White who has killed multiple people, who sells meth, and who poisoned a child. But he's put up against--in the final season--vicious white supremacist murderers.
DeleteThere's a lot to be said about Goodfellas, not only as a movie, but also as an interpretation of Wiseguy. In the book, there is no fourth wall break; therefore, Henry comes off as whiny and irritated, since it sounds like he's just rambling on. However, the fourth wall break in the film created a more personal space. It was no longer viewing a story as a removed character (the audience)and became something we were involved with like we were a character in the story. The fourth wall break really solidifies the feeling of being inside someone's head. There are many different film techniques used in the film that take place of literary descriptions. For example, in Wiseguy, Henry Hill can show us through his words how glamorous it was to be a wiseguy and all the beauty that could come from it. However, since there's very little time for descriptive audio in a movie, Martin Scorsese shows us the glam through sweeping and tracking camera movements. One scene that comes to mind is in the very beginning when Henry takes Karen out for a second time to the club. The camera tracks them through their journey into the club from a back entrance. The shot doesn't stop as it sweeps and follows them through all the hustle and bustle creating a very exciting atmosphere. These tracking shots seemed to only ever be used to describe the perks of being a wiseguy versus the downfalls, and is why i believe the film glorifies wiseguys versus general crime or violence. Another interesting film technique used was during the dinner scene in which James Conway (Robert DeNiro) is asking Henry to fly to Florida. Having read the book, we know the paranoia and tension being created in this scene because the book told us so. However, in the film, Scorsese does a dolly zoom (a technique in which the camera travels through space while also magnifying the background) to tighten the space between the two characters and show that tension that would've normally been stated.
ReplyDeleteI don't think there's anybody we're specifically supposed to be rooting for. In my eyes, I wasn't rooting for either of them because I viewed them as antagonists. If anything, I was rooting for Karen who I felt was shown as having been thrown into the mobster world and was too blinded by love to help herself get out of it. I think in the end, Henry revealed himself to be somewhat of an anti-hero by doing "what's right."
Nice response, Alex, esp. your analysis of film style in the movie. That back door scene is actually one of the most famous shots in cinema and was done w/ a steadicam (a handheld camera that has a balancing apparatus so that it doesn't shake). The shot is redone in the film Swingers (1996) right after the film nerds debate about the greatest shot in film, either that shot from Goodfellas or the slo-mo opening shot from Reservoir Dogs (1992)--that shot is redone too.
DeleteJimmy "the gent" got his nickname because he, at least, had one redeeming quality-- he (initially) took care of the people that he worked with. He was a "gentleman". Tommy was simply a cold-blooded murderer, ready to use violence at any time. While Tommy, Jimmy, and Henry were all gangsters, we definitely seem to be routing for Henry. He seemed to be an actual "good fella". From the beginning, he criminal career seemed to revolve mostly around making a buck. His goal was not to hurt people, he was just in it for the hustle.
ReplyDeleteTo add to my comment, I think "breaking the fourth wall" in the film gave us a chance to better understand the character in the story (Henry) because he was expressing to us directly how he felt. I think the film is glorifying both violence and crime which to me has an equal relation. Growing up in the world of a mobster all Henry knew was violence and crime. In order for him to get what he needed or wanted he had to commit some sort violent act or crime. When it comes to rooting for someone I personally wasn't rooting for anyone because this is the life they chose so they had to step up to the consequences even for Karen because even after she found out who he was and what he did she decided to stay so I had no sympathy for anyone especially since at the end they all turned on each other being that they were suppose to protect and be a family for one another.
ReplyDeletewe root for Henry perhaps because is the better person out of the bunch. He is not a great person but he is not a murderer or heartless like Jimmy and Tommy. He idolized and became involved with gangsters at a young age. I can understand why he wanted to be a gangster. As a kid, he looked at his father and saw that he worked hard for little. Gangsters however, looked like they had everything. Having a chance to be around them and being embraced by them were the greatest things he could have hoped for as a child. That's understandable. Henry is the one who is most deserving of a second chance at life and he gets it, too bad he doesn't seem to appreciate it too much
ReplyDeleteEveryone is rooting for Henry maybe because he got involved with the mob very young. It seems like Henry was the hero in the movie.I read the book, but looking at the movie cause me to realize what was really going on in the mob. All the murders and Henry's role n the mod. It really hit me. Maybe the flim was glorifing crime however the murders were cold and terrible . These people ate the best food.
ReplyDeleteProfessor,I thank you for your condolence it means a lot to me at this time. I forgot to say thank you.
ReplyDeleteI believe the main reason the Lufthansa Heist is set off-stage because the point of the movie is Henry describing the "life" of a mobster and how they lived their everyday lives. The heist was just another hit for them. Also I understand how some people may feel sympathy for Henry and want to "root" for him, but he was just as bad as Jimmy or Tommy. He always wanted to be a gangster, I mean is that not what he said. That meant you couldn't "rat" or snitch on anything or anybody. However, Henry breaks that rule to save his own butt and stay out of jail for years.
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