So yeah, remember when we all more or less liked Clovis? Or at least didn;t outright think he was an incompetent douche? He swore... we laughed. Lets take a trip back to Yesterday sometime around 01:51:47 PM... (queue
Wanye's World sounds that skjerva will fücking hate)
Goodfellas vs. Glengary Glen Ross: AKA, the F**K matchup
Warning swearing ahead!
These two movies share nothing in common, with the obvious exception that they both have a f**k load of swearing in them. F**k is used as a noun, a verb, adjective, and adverb. It is used 246 times in Goodfellas for a total of 1.7 times per minute. In Glengary it is only used 128 times, for a meager 1.28 times per minute. Not to mention the many uses of bastard, s**t, c**t, a**hole, etc. So on this front it is pretty clear that Goodfellas f**cking owns Glengary.
Lets pause for a moment and really take some time to appreciate the word f**k:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rX7-R54-Q8
Now on to our main event....
Goodfellas
If you have not seen the movie here is a spoiler filled plot summary with BUNNIES!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1FraaVQFtg
There is not much to say about this movie that has not been said so I decided to focus on the common misconception that the film glorifies the mob lifestyle.
"As far back as I remember I wanted to be a gangster"
The movie opens with a scene of brutal violence and the first voice over we hear is this famous line. We then hear a long dialogue about how great it is to be a goodfella.
"One day kids from the neighborhood carried my mothers groceries home. You know why? It was outta respect"
The first half of the movie does, in fact, highlight the good side of being a mobster. Of course, there is a good side. Money, woman, respect, freedom.
While the first half of the film shows the positive side of the lifestyle, the second half is a pretty clear admonition. One of the things I love is that Scorcese brings us back to the opening scene to see it play out. They bury the body, and once done, the screen turns blood red signally that the good times are over.
By the end of the movie it is pretty clear that everyone has been punished. They are either in jail or dead. The physical appearance of Ray Liotta tells us all we need to know about how great the mob lifestyle really is;
At the start....
and at the end...
Lets let the great Ebert sum it up for me...
"GoodFellas is about guilt more than anything else. But it is not a straightforward morality play, in which good is established and guilt is the appropriate reaction toward evil. No, the hero of this film feels guilty for not upholding the Mafia code - guilty of the sin of betrayal. And his punishment is banishment, into the witness protection program, where nobody has a name and the headwaiter certainly doesn't know it."
Its a movie about ugly people. Yet, consider how many great and glorious films are made about ugly subjects, while the substance of beautiful lives often make trite, glossy voids. Scorsese's film of course centers around these people, but it is his film, not theirs.
How do we sum up a film accused of amorality?
Leave the last word to Tommy: "Yahoo, ya motherf**ker!"
Glengary Glen Ross
I have seen this movie 4 or five times now and I have never really understood its acclaim. Yes there is great acting by the entire cast.
My problem is very simple: there is no movie in this movie!
Its a great play, perhaps one of the best American plays of the last decade. However, there is no cinema in this adaption. It consists almost exclusively of close-up shots of talking heads. There are only a couple sets and the only directing decision appears to have been to use very rapid cuts, which makes it feel more like a play (as if we were in the audience and rapidly shifting our focus from one actor on stage to another).
I guess my ultimate criticism would be, why see this on screen and not on stage? Did the movie part add anything? I think not.
On to the motherf**king verdict:
In some ways its not really f**king fair that I got this matchup given that Goodfellas is one of my favorite f**king films of all-f**king time! To those who would complain; f**k ya! Its a brilliant, near perfect f**king movie. Given that its competition is not even a f**king movie, I think its pretty clear that Goodfellas kicks the living s**t out of Glengary, throws it in the f**king trunk, drives it to the f**cking country, stabs it 6 more f**king times, and buries is dead f**king carcass in the woods.
For those keeping score I used f**k 17 times.
« Last Edit: Today at 12:19:53 AM by pixote »
(that last part I found interesting)