Forget ‘The Godfather’ — Prime Video’s Crime Epic Is a Masterpiece From Start to Finish

Releasing any mafia-related films in the wake of The Godfather seemed like a fool’s errand. After all, the first two chapters in Francis Ford Coppola‘s epic about the rise and fall of the Corleone family in postwar America are widely considered to be the high-water mark of cinema. As a broad, operatic statement about legacy, capitalism, and the American Dream, The Godfather and The Godfather: Part II track the full scope of being driven by ambition in this nation.

If anyone was going to touch the impeccable brilliance of Coppola, it was destined to be the director’s friend and filmmaking peer, Martin Scorsese, who was also drawn to character studies about morally grey characters and their relationship to power and masculine urges. While he tackled organized crime from a distance in Mean Streets, Scorsese proved to be the modern voice of the criminal underworld with his enduring masterpiece, Goodfellas, which is now streaming on Prime Video for all those looking to re-watch it for the 100th time.

‘Goodfellas’ Is an Honest Portrayal of Organized Crime

Upon release in 1990, Goodfellas, a modest box office success, was uproariously acclaimed by critics and was honored by the Academy Awards, although it controversially lost Best Picture to Dances with Wolves. Still, few would’ve thought that Scorsese’s biographical crime epic about the life of Henry Hill (Ray Liotta) as a soldier in a New York mob family would become such a canonical classic. Often cited as a film worthy of endless re-watches at home due to its fast-paced and intoxicating style, no one would bat an eye if you argued Goodfellas as Scorsese’s finest work, ranked alongside his formative masterpieces like Taxi Driver and Raging Bull.

Despite their textual and thematic similarities, Goodfellas is the ultimate foil to The Godfather. Without taking anything away from the greatness of Coppola’s film, its portrait of organized crime feels fantastical and romanticized compared to the template created by Scorsese. However, there is a sense of intentionality in this creative decision, as Coppola used the mafia as a backdrop for a modern-day re-telling of King Lear. The warmth of Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando) is a deliberate tactic to get the viewer to grasp the contradictory nature of his demeanor with his violent, cutthroat profession.

Martin Scorsese’s Filmmaking Re-Defined Cinematic Language in ‘Goodfellas’

While The Godfather paints an idealized image of the mafia, Goodfellas presents the raw, ugly truth of organized crime. In a bold narrative decision that shaped Scorsese’s unfair reputation for glorifying crime, the director honestly underscores that being a gangster, hijacking trucks, running extortion and racketeering rings, and engaging in debauchery provides a burst of euphoria, and there’s a reason why people are drawn to this world. Of course, Scorsese tracks the tragic downfall of all its denizens with as much fury, which separates the film from the mob movies that aspire to reach its heights. Within the runtime of Goodfellas, the first half is the all-nighter, while the second half, which features shocking murders, bouts with addiction, and extreme paranoia, is the killer hangover. His fascinations with faith, guilt, temptation, and repentance are all covered in his magnum opus.

Stylistically, a budding cinephile could learn everything about filmmaking by watching Goodfellas, which deployed visual and technical flourishes that others have copied but never perfected. Exemplified by Thelma Schoonmaker‘s editing and Michael Ballhaus‘ cinematography, the film is a pure re-creation of the dizzying and harrowing sensation of being a wiseguy. Schoonmaker’s frantic editing, which often breaks the conventional rules to profound effect, reflects the iconoclastic behavior of Henry Hill, Jimmy Conway (Robert De Niro), and Tommy DeVito (Joe Pesci). Ballhaus whips the camera all over the frame, striking a balance between fly-on-the-wall documentary photography and heightened, Brechtian style (the fourth-wall breaks and discernible filmmaking techniques). Scorsese, renowned for his use of non-diegetic songs, tracks the history of American pop music in the film, starting with ’50s doo-wop and ending with psychedelic ’70s rock.

A movie with this level of violence and unsettling moments shouldn’t be this fun, but Martin Scorsese’s cinematic language makes him an iconic figure for casual audiences and die-hard cinephiles. While he is justifiably skeptical about organized crime as a den of sin and destruction, he shrewdly identifies that this underbelly of society needs to feel comforting and inviting for people like Henry Hill to give their lives over to. Watching Goodfellas again is like a family reunion with tons of Italian food. Just don’t ask where the meat came from.