Martin Scorsese was a young man living in the “Little Italy”, neighborhood of New York City in the early part of the 60’s. His breakthrough movie is a story based on actual people he knew growing up in this neighborhood. In the movie, he restricts the characters of his story to bar owners, customers, and gangsters. “Mean Streets” is not interested in the colorful, vibrant, and more legal aspects of the Italian Americans living in New York during this pre-cultural revolutionary period. Viewed as a snapshot to the underbelly of the Italian underworld, the movie is unmatched. This is not a glorified romantic view of the Mafia from above, rather it is a character study of the lower-level grunts who do the dirty work while never wanting to get their hands dirty.
Unlike most personal nostalgic movies, none of the characters shown represent the person who wrote the story, being Scorsese. In his film, Scorsese is representing people he knew while growing up. Scorsese was a scholar who went to university to study film and eventually became one of America’s great auteurs of cinema. On the other hand, “Mean Streets” is all about people who are not very smart, lazy, and who tend to live in a fantasy world of imaginary self-importance. This is also the movie that kick-started Scorsese’s career. He had previously made a good student film, and one of Roger Corman’s quickie, low-budget action flicks. Having written the screenplay for “Mean Streets”, and in spite of its small budget, this is still the first full blown “Scorsese Film”.
The movie follows a few days in the life of one Charlie Cappa (Harvey Keitel), who is a small debt collector for a local criminal running numbers for the mob. One of the mobsters happens to be Charlie’s uncle. Charlie likes to dress sharply and act cool. He is a friendly, pragmatic young man who can’t help being liked by everyone. It does not occur to him that the fact that he still lives at home with his mother sort of negates the coolness he attributes to himself. He is also in love with the girl in the building across from him. She is sweet and wants him to move out of the neighborhood with her to a better part of town. Charlie believes that his uncle will eventually gift him with a restaurant that is about to go bankrupt partially due to debts the owner owes the mob. Charlie will stay living with his mother in the same neighborhood, collecting mob debts in the belief that his future will eventually make him a respectable restaurant owner. The fact that he had no idea how to run a restaurant never occurred to him. His largest downfall is that he feels responsible for the welfare of his girlfriend’s unstable cousin, Johnny-Boy (Robert DeNiro in a superb performance that made him a star). Johnny-boy owes money all over the neighborhood and has a gambling problem. He also owes money to the mob, which is a major problem for Charlie.
This is the movie where Scorsese started to develop his very clear and precise filmmaking style. When we first meet Charlie, we see him after being at church in the day, entering a Little Italy night club at night, through the now famous Scorsese first person viewpoint. Brought to life by a long tracking shot. This is a breathtaking scene of a drunken Charlie entering his neighborhood club. The scene occurs right at the start of the film, after the opening credits, and after that we see Charlie lighting a candle in a church. From the church, the movie quickly switches to the performers’ stage of the nightclub where a beautiful black dancer is dancing almost naked to the Rolling Stones’,, “Tell Me”. The camera then immediately tracks Charlie from the back as he enters the club, shakes some hands, acknowledges glances from waitresses, and jumps on the stage with the dancer, dancing with her for a few seconds. It is a spellbinding scene that visually lets me know what was in the mind of Charlie and how he saw himself. Not to be undone, a few minutes later we get the introduction to the club of Johnny-Boy with another long tracking shot made to the rhythm of a Rolling Stones song. This time the song is, “Jumping Jack Flash”, and the viewpoint is not the first person (Johnny-boy) but the third person (Charlie), as we see DeNiro’s character enter through the eyes of Charlie. The songs also set the tone for the scenes. “Tell Me “is a happy, cool song of confidence, while “Jumping Jack Flash” is a juvenile boasting song of vacant fearlessness that foretells danger. Scorsese would throughout his career mix pop and visual to perfection. “Mean Streets” is full of the Scorsese style, and the movie has the innate ability to let this style stay entuned to the personal life of the characters.
The total ensemble acting of the entire cast is superb in the movie, but it is the tour de force performance of DeNiro as Johnny-boy, that steals the show. Many of us have met people like Johnny-boy in our lives, and usually during our youth. He is fearless and clueless at the same time. Lying to his best friend at the same time as hustling the bartender. Everyone knows he is not to be trusted, but DeNiro brings him a childlike demeanor that forces Charlie to want to defend him, which will turn out to be his undoing. Regardless of all the great atmospheric scenes found in the film, the movie would never have worked if it was not for DeNiro’s performance.
Martin Scorsese would go on and visit the gangster genre throughout his illustrious career, and it is this, his first gangster movie that set the tone for all the rest. “Mean Streets” may be a small film, but it is also a highly influential and visually stunning masterpiece.
1001 Movies before you die 