About The Irishman: Analysis

Rating: 10/10 (21 December 2019)

Martin Scorsese's art of narration is when Robert De Niro's lips talked only after a short narrative
sequence; As if he went from the third personal person "He" to the first personal person "I".
« The Irishman » is an unconventional road movie with many flashbacks. Two couples in car for a trip
where only Joe Pesci knows the finality.
Robert De Niro the driver will not be informed of his mission until the same day he will have to
accomplish it: the execution of Al Pacino Alias Hoffa.
Francis Scott Fitzgerald said: « Show me a hero, and I'll write you a tragedy »
Scorsese managed three heroes and delivered a tragedy issued from a Greco-Roman line.
This three hour and thirty-five minutes feature movie whose facts happened in the second half of the
twentieth century in the United States is composed of four chapters:
▪ De Niro and Pesci
▪ Pacino
▪ Execution of Pacino
▪ And epilog
"The Irishman" starts with a metaphor: "I heard you paint houses" and we laugh about it. But as the
movie goes on, we can see other metaphors, more serious this time:
▪ Veal's meat transport and the expedition of humans to the beyond
▪ The cigarette's smoke and self-vigilance
▪ The alcohol and the vigilance of others
▪ The watch is eternal time
▪ The ring is a sacred alliance
▪ Sunglasses are protection
▪ The transported fish and the expected fishing of Pacino-Hoffa
▪ And finally, death that prowls around the one who personifies it from the beginning
Scorsese brushes us with an anthropological vision of three men's profiles:
▪ De Niro who has chosen converting passivity to activity following the metaphor mentioned
above
He had one slip in his mournful career, not completed though: the laundry affair. De Niro is
put back to his place
He is the FAITHFUL DOG of his unique master: Pesci. Since the order of this latter, He
changed to a Hemachatus haemachatus, famous SPITTING COBRA with the only difference
that De Niro gives an instantaneous death without any latency.
The scene at the grocery store is not useless. De Niro bragging the power of his new social
status has brought DOUBTS to his daughter who started searching for CERTAINTY. Thus, De
Niro missed his speech like a sophist.
De Niro is a workforce. He has as a big weapon his fingers that push the trigger.
Not to mention many extras whose death is announced with few bullets received below the
cranial vault, signature of De Niro.
▪ Pesci as a hypothetical god of stratagems has two knowledges:
o Pragmatism, allowing him to make THE DIAGNOSIS. The sequence of fixing the truck
is a good example.
o Psychoanalysis, allowing him to read in the minds of others. The sequence of De
Niro's daughter who knew a little something is another example.
Pesci has a big weapon: INSPECTION, making observation a mean of truth
One and only paradox, it is De Niro's daughter, like a deaf-mute having recourse to
KNOWLEDGE by SIGHT.
In different settings, she could have been the spiritual son of Pesci in this phallocrat
organization. She is like a mirror that reflects a judged and judgeable image defining one's
identity. She recalls the reflective mirror-like shield of PERSEUS.
Pesci is the cleaner of the organization, if not the regulator. All his decisions are executed by
his faithful dog.
Later, he will introduce this latter to Pacino to control him, manage him and finally execute
him.
De Niro and Pesci are winners. They will wait for death in their respective chairs like kings.
▪ Pacino, President of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters union, flirting at high levels
with the organization is an extravert personage handling rhetoric with brilliance as the attic
speaker DEMOSTHENE. His major weapon is therefore his tongue.
However, he always needs third parties to exist. He forbids his interlocuters to drink before
or during interviews.
Also, his intransigence with respect to the accuracy of his meetings reveals his weak control
of flexibilities.
Pacino, after getting out of prison claimed his union as Julius Caesar changing the Republic of
Rome to a dictatorship.
Pacino is a looser. He died at the hands of Brutus - De Niro with the approval of the majority
of senators-chiefs of the organization.
The betrayal of his adoptive son recalls that of Caligula towards Tiberius.
The epilog is a long adagio assai that recalls Beethoven's marcia funebre.
De Niro who personifies death from the beginning has finally a legitimate meeting with it. He
has lost everything, even contact with his beloved daughter; he only can turn to the
ETERNAL, like JUDE APOSTLE. He watches the arrival of the reaper leaving his door half
opened.
The camera's movement as if death is roaming around, has been seen three times: opening,
ending, and when De Niro, who was DEATH, was looking in a restaurant for a person who
was not there.
Not to mention the close and deep relationship between the organization, the union and
politics. However, that is another anthropological aspect of the story and history.
About the rejuvenation of our three actors, we were left hungry. We would have loved to see
their faces from Godfather, Casino, Goodfellas and other Serpico. However, this
technological feat at its first steps is far from reaching the Jupiter's Fountain of Youth.
By contrasting the three men's profiles, the difference between their acting can be revealed:
the theatrical acting of Pacino, being an extravert character is opposed to the
cinematographic just acting of the couple De Niro - Pesci.
The soundtrack of the movie is a nostalgic long trip in this America in a discomfort state.
In total, Scorsese gave us a REALISTIC vision of the organization, this time without the
exuberant luxury of Goodfellas and Casino.
One last sneaky metaphor: life is a metaphor of death.
Simple Mister Scorsese, « c'est un score saisi ».
Mohammed Elkabbadj
Professor of Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases
8, Rue Oued Zem appt 2, Place Pïètrie
Rabat
MOROCCO