This week on Bad Dads Film Review, we head into early Scorsese territory with Mean Streets, starring Harvey Keitel as Charlie and Robert De Niro as Johnny Boy.
It is New York, 1973: Catholic guilt, bar-room bravado, small-time gangster pressure, unpaid debts, family loyalty, loaded silences, unloaded guns, and the unmistakable beginning of the Scorsese crime-movie language that would later explode into Goodfellas.
What we covered
- The famous opening idea: “You don’t make up for your sins in church. You do it on the streets.”
- How clearly the film points toward later Scorsese: Catholicism, crime, music, neighbourhood codes, restless camera moves and men trapped by loyalty.
- Harvey Keitel’s Charlie: a young man trying to be a gangster, a good Catholic, a loyal friend, and a decent person — all at once, badly.
- Charlie’s guilt, the candle-burning, and the sense that a few Hail Marys are nowhere near enough for what he thinks he deserves.
- Robert De Niro’s Johnny Boy as a reckless human hand grenade: charming, funny, dangerous, and absolutely allergic to consequences.
- Johnny Boy’s debts, the pressure from Michael, and why the lack of respect becomes almost more dangerous than the lack of money.
- The rooftop gun scene, including the attempt to shoot the light off the Empire State Building.
- The “mook” bar fight — possibly the most memorable use of the word “mook” in cinema history.
- The corrupt cop casually taking a bribe after the bar fight.
- Teresa, Charlie’s relationship with her, and the family/friendship knot that keeps Charlie tied to Johnny Boy.
- The grimy restaurant kitchen scene and its spectacularly dubious food hygiene energy.
- The ending: the drive-by shooting, Scorsese’s possible cameo as the gunman, the crash, the sirens, and the refusal to offer neat redemption.
- The low-budget invention: LA standing in for New York in places, Scorsese’s family and friends appearing, and the camera-rig drunk shot attached to Keitel.
- The fashion: De Niro’s hair, the sideburns, the silk shirts, and the sheer 1973 Italian-American wardrobe content.
Key quotes / moments
- Sidey spots the Goodfellas DNA almost immediately.
- Dan calls Johnny Boy “a human hand grenade.”
- Reegs remembers the “mook” scene as the thing that stuck with him from the film.
- Cris singles out De Niro’s hair and later the restaurant kitchen, which looks like one of the worst episodes of Kitchen Nightmares.
- The dads admire the film as the raw blueprint for Scorsese’s later, more polished crime films.
Verdict
A strong recommend. The dads recognise that Mean Streets is looser and rougher than Scorsese’s later work, but that is part of its power: it is gritty, restless, funny, violent, Catholic, and absolutely foundational.
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