Great Movie, But Pretty Overrated.

Rating: 1/10 (10 June 2015)

I did enjoy this film, but I think it gets a little too much praise. All three Godfather movies are far superior. This was innovative, but it ranks too high in all lists.
Goodfellas is based on the memoir "Wiseguy" about Henry Hill's life as a gangster. Ray Liotta plays Hill and gives are star-making performance. Robert De Niro plays Jimmy The Gent and Joe Pesci earns a well-deserved Oscar as Tommy DeVito. Hill grew up in urban New York and wanted to be a mobster his whole life. Only, he wasn't cut out. Tommy and Jimmy were his best friends and extremely brutal. There was reluctancy sometimes in Henry. He marries Karen (Bracco) and their family life is well-documented. As Henry becomes more like the other thugs, bis life crumbles and surrenders to the witness protection program. I thought that the story was great as it cover major parts in Hill's life and some infamous crimes in American history. Scorsese also recreates some bits from the book that come out better in the movie. For example, he adds lots to the scene with Spider.
I'm not saying this is the best mob movie ever like Roger Ebert said and I'm not saying it sucked. It will never reach The Godfather heights. Although the editing and film techniques were top- notch, it was not enough. One thing I didn't like was that it practically glorified being a mobster. There's so much loyalty and it makes it out to be fun. Being a gangster is not fun. Sure it's good that everybody is treated better, but they do horrible things that puts everybody in danger. Goodfellas does show that the mafia can be bad, but there's so many circumstances surrounding them that can be learned from.
Another thing I didn't like was the music. The music was too loud and too good. Great music such as the Rolling Stones and Bobby Darin were playing. They proved to be distracting and did not fit well with some bit. Why not just use regular background music instead of hit songs that are overpowering?
Then there's the flow and story. As I mentioned above, the story is good but does not come across to its potential. Some of the scenes go great by themselves but not all work well as a whole. They jump around too much without giving leads in or out. It just goes from thing-to- thing-to-thing-thing over the course of minutes, plus there's the distracting music. I don't mind 146 minutes, but it seems like 5 hours was condensed in half its time. Some parts could have been cut out and replaced with more flows and better plot development.
Goodfellas is a brilliant flick, but not one of the best.