Mean Streets

Not very much happens. Marty filmed a great filler with a couple of brighter moments. Excellent actors, Johnny Boy De Niro was most impressive and a surprisingly posh Harvey Keitel also does a good job. But so what, if the excellently written dialogs don’t have a powerful result. This is simply a prelude to Scorsese’s later, more fundamental movies. (12/29/2011)

I have a little problem with Martin Scorsese. His older movies are not fun for me, even though I consider his newer ones some of the best flicks there are. I’m such a heathen that I gave Taxi Driver and Raging Bull three stars, and I will do the same with Mean Streets. In this case mainly because it’s so boring. Well, boring might be too strong a word. It’d be safer to say that the story is not as captivating as other mafia crime movies, failing to make me give it 100% of my attention while watching it. (01/22/2013)

In the film, it is evident that Scorsese was still exploring the world of cinema. His potential was apparent, and a social atmosphere of the 70s emerged on the screen - racism, the Vietnam War, minority integration, etc. The film follows the story of a foot soldier for the mafia who works as a collector for his influential uncle. He is not cut out for the job, not tough enough, but a family business is a family business, and being loyal pays off. Mean Streets lacks coherence, better character development, and work with them. The story is diluted into a chain of loosely connected scenes from the lives of the lower ranks of the mafia. It is nice to see the young faces of De Niro and Keitel, whom I had fixed as older guys from movies made 20 years later. The film itself, however, is only a slightly above-average affair. Overall impression: 60%. (01/25/2013)

A fantastically portrayed atmosphere of New York in the 1970s with all the afros and the smoking, but, in terms of script, the film almost fails, because things get going only in the last 10 minutes. The rest is just a bar crawl with long shots with no editing, where the camera atypically flits around a bar trying to authentically portray the world of the time. Scorsese's start, De Niro's awesome performance. (11/24/2015)

When you look at "Mean Streets," it's hard to imagine it being associated with that little man who looks so innocently and defenselessly. However, Martin Scorsese directed a film that could easily serve as one of the inspirational sources for Quentin Tarantino's first film, "Reservoir Dogs." And even for other films, while we're at it. Scorsese was not afraid to show the street as it really looked. He didn't exaggerate, but he also didn't hide anything. There's not much violence here, just fights that are definitely better than in the film "Raging Bull". However, what stands out the most are the characters and their performances. Especially the trio of De Niro, Keitel, and Proval, because this time it's truly their acting performances that take the lead. (10/29/2013)