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The Good Fella
 "Who the hell is Ray Liotta?," I thought. Like many Martin Scorsese fans, I eagerly anticipated Goodfellas, his first gangster movie in the seventeen years since Mean Streets. Truth be told, I did know who Ray Liotta was. He had scared me with his unhinged portrayal of the ex-boyfriend from hell in Something Wild. I appreciated his understated, serene work as Shoeless Joe Jackson in Field of Dreams. But now here he was sharing equal billing with Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci on the Goodfellas poster, and I read that Liotta had the lead role. Really? His work up until then to me didn't justify his place at the center of the film. Then I saw Goodfellas and realized how wrong I was. More than any other gangster film, even The Godfather, Goodfellas explored how and why the mafia worked. For that we needed a guide, and Liotta as real-life former gangster Henry Hill fit the bill perfectly. His narration features much exposition, taken from Hill's interviews with author Nicholas Pileggi, who wrote the source book Wiseguy and co-wrote the screenplay with Scorsese. Such exposition can so easily grow tedious, but in Goodfellas it never does. Much of the credit goes to the writing, but some also goes to Liotta, who tells the story like someone you're having a beer with at a bar. He has a "Can you believe we got away with this?" excitement for the first two-thirds of the film. We don't condone Hill's actions (at least I hope not), but we understand him. By the time we get to the last third, when Hill's life goes sour, Liotta's relatability has us hooked. Liotta shines just as much in front of the camera. Think of the most famous shot in the movie, and one of the most iconic in film history. Hill and his future wife Karen (Lorraine Bracco) walk through the Copacabana kitchen and are treated like royalty in a long Steadicam tracking shot. Martin Scorsese and his team had the guts to plan that shot and then the skills to execute it, but that shot does not work without Liotta. He imbues Hill with such charm and confidence that we believe he practically owns the place. At the same time, when Hill talks to Karen, Liotta shows a little nervousness like anyone trying to impress a date. He even throws in a slight giggle. The topper comes when Karen asks what Hill does for a living, and Hill replies "Construction." Liotta says this line with such conviction that it's the prefect topper for this virtuoso scene. Liotta's versatility becomes key to the film. He has a fierceness in his eyes critical for a character of violent acts, but also a sweetness for Henry's loving moments with Karen. Liotta shows this range in just two minutes when Karen holds a gun on Henry. The honey in his voice as Henry tries to talk Karen down, makes his fury when Henry gets the gun back even more chilling. Think of Henry's unbridled joy in the shower learning of the Lufthansa heist. Liotta commits to that moment so much that we can share that joy, even if we don't want to. He makes us the silent partner in Henry's crimes. Liotta also picks his spots to let Henry's guard down. He pauses just for a second after Tommy (Pesci) murders the "made man" Billy Batts (Frank Vincent) and does so again after Tommy kills the kid bartender Spider (Michael Imperioli) at a poker game. In those pauses Liotta touches on how the two completely needless killings are maybe a little too much even for someone as immersed in the violent life as much as Henry. Just a little sliver of empathy. Of course, Henry goes back to work, again making the audience complicit along the way. The film's and Liotta's tour-de-force arrives towards the end, when a coked-up Henry tries to get through an busy day with too many things to do and a police helicopter constantly flying above. This is Scorsese at the height of his abilities, along with brilliant editing by his longtime collaborator Thelma Schoonmaker. The rush of the montage and the perfect needle drops, most notably "Jump Into the Fire" by Harry Nilsson, propel the scene into a paranoid frenzy. Once again though, this sequence fails without Liotta. He gives Henry the drive and desperation fitting for a man barely hanging on. Liotta's withered out energy pushes the pace so much that when the cops finally do confront Henry, he seems almost relieved that at least the day's struggle is over. The capper comes in a bookend to the Lufthansa shower moment, when Henry realizes that Karen flushed away his last stash of coke. Liotta has excelled at Henry's many rage scenes throughout the film, but here shows Henry's vulnerability. When Henry and Karen break down in tears, we feel for them even though by any objective measure they well-deserved what happened to them. That's a tribute to how much Liotta and Bracco invested in their roles. After seeing Goodfellas, I felt that Liotta would become a star like De Niro or Al Pacino, both of whom also played gangsters in their breakout roles. That never happened for Liotta, largely because he never found the right film to build on what he achieved. Undaunted, Liotta became one of film's most reliable character actors. While he may have never become a successful leading man, his name always made me smile when I saw it in the credits. True to form, he often seemed most natural with cop or gangster roles in films such as Copland, Narc, Smokin' Aces, Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, and Killing Them Softly. If the role called for someone to be intimidating to the lead, you couldn't find anyone better than Liotta. He could play that so well against stars ranging from Seth Rogen in Observe and Report to Bradley Cooper in The Place Beyond the Pines. Noah Baumbach wisely cast Liotta as bulldog divorce lawyer Jay Morotta (Was he specifically going for a name that rhymed with the actor?) in Marriage Story. Liotta makes Jay so ferocious that he even scares his own client. We instantly get why Laura Dern as the opposing counsel cringes when she sees Liotta coming down the courthouse hall. But Liotta didn't take himself too seriously, having fun spoofing his image in "The Simpsons" and The Muppets Most Wanted. In the latter he appeared with Danny Trejo, bringing the two famed tough guys together in a dance number. How fitting that Liotta's last movie in theaters while he was still alive was the "Sopranos" prequel The Many Saints of Newark. "The Sopranos" built on the Goodfellas world, characters, and legacy in so many ways, including casting some of the same actors, Bracco and Imperioli in particular. But the show's braintrust could never make it work with casting Liotta. Liotta's entry into the Sopranos-verse proved worth the wait. He played two twin brothers, each very different, with the same intensity he brought to all his roles. As the flamboyant, impulsive and cruel "Hollywood" Dick Moltisanti, Liotta was all in, in a way that echoed Pesci's Oscar winning turn in Goodfellas. Liotta was even more captivating as Salvatore "Sally" Moltisanti, a weathered, broken man who has seen too much. In one key moment, Sally's nephew lies to his face about how someone died. Sally doesn't say anything, but those expressive eyes, a Liotta hallmark, show that he knows the truth. Liotta's death last week at the age of 67 made me think of Henry Hill's fate at the end of Goodfellas. Hill didn't die, but in witness protection he became a regular person, which to him was worse than death. "I'm an average nobody. I get to live the rest of my life like a schnook," Hill says. That final mediocrity may have doomed Hill, but Liotta was never an average nobody. He left us too early, but in the right part, and in that one perfect film, few have burned brighter. Adam Spector June 1, 2022 Contact us: |
