In Hoffa's Shadow author takes apart "Irishman" myth

[Amershire_Ed]

This movie sucked IMO ! Felt like I was watching the same old BS Casino/Goodfellas . Sheeran killed Gallo ?? Lmaooo Now that was real over the Top reaching BS ! I have no idea about Hoffa ? Possible but I don't believe it

You are legit the first person I’ve heard from that didn’t love it. And one of the more consistent descriptions of the film in the reviews I’ve read was that it’s **very different** from Goodfellas and Casino. The Gallo stuff is highly highly unlikely but I don’t think Scorsese was going for a true to life historical film. Scorsese, and many of the people that have reviewed the film, portray it as more of a film that analyzes and depicts the moral rot of someone’s conscious that spends a life connected to organized crime.

I’m gonna catch it tonight. I hope you aren’t right haha

[Grouchy Sinatra]

Scorsese said all along, don't expect Goodfellas. Yet that's exactly what so many people did. lol.

[Bklyn21]

This movie sucked IMO ! Felt like I was watching the same old BS Casino/Goodfellas . Sheeran killed Gallo ?? Lmaooo Now that was real over the Top reaching BS ! I have no idea about Hoffa ? Possible but I don't believe it

You are legit the first person I’ve heard from that didn’t love it. And one of the more consistent descriptions of the film in the reviews I’ve read was that it’s **very different** from Goodfellas and Casino. The Gallo stuff is highly highly unlikely but I don’t think Scorsese was going for a true to life historical film. Scorsese, and many of the people that have reviewed the film, portray it as more of a film that analyzes and depicts the moral rot of someone’s conscious that spends a life connected to organized crime.

I’m gonna catch it tonight. I hope you aren’t right haha

I fell asleep over an hour n a half in ! Same music , Same camera shots and The gangsters were the same just like Goodfellas and casino , My GF said the same

[Grouchy Sinatra]

Rewatching on Netflix right now. I wonder if Buffalino ever really wore that Christmas tie. That thing rocks.

[MSFRD]

Saw it a couple nights ago at a small independent cinema even though I have access to Netflix. Being the first Scorsese movie with the old actors I would actually get the chance to see I decided to see it the traditional way.
Very disappointed. I was not expecting Goodfellas or Casino but for anyone to say Scorsese didn’t try to get some of that magic back with the jokes or the music or the narration then they are fooling themselves.
Besides De Niro, Pacino and Pesci looked tired; Pesci looked like he didn’t wanna even be there. I don’t blame them, we forget how old they really are. But Pacino is a shell of his former self, that raspy voice and over the top mannerisms are cringeworthy. He barely looks like he knows what is going on around him. I got more out of the characters in Donnie Brasco in what around two hours than three and a half.
The younger actors who fill in the rest of the cast just don’t cut it anymore. When you watched Goodfellas or even a low budget mob movie, the background actors looked and sounded the part because they were of he same generation and grew up in those neighbourhoods. The had the look, the sound and the swagger. The guy playing Sally Bugs was nowhere near convincing enough to play a menacing character. The fake, over-embellished Jersey or BK accent is laughable. This film needed to be done at least 8-9 years earlier and 15 would have done it.
For me it just reminds me that that era and the people in it are all gone, and so with it everything else that came with it. The mob movie portraying the golden years is dead.

[dack2001]

I didn't buy the actor playing Chuckie O'Brian but the rest I thought were top notch. Even Sally Bugs. DeNiro is never going to be the same as 1980 but even he brought the best he could muster in his old age. It wasn't nostalgia either, its just a different movie than Goodfellas and Casino. More of a meditation on aging and damage left behind by a life of selfish, bad decisions that seem necessary at the time.

[Amershire_Ed]

I like how Sheeran or any theory can be exactly debunked when it is an unsolved murder where all the key players that did know anything are long gone.

If nobody knows who did it or the details, how can you rule anyone out?

Plus weren’t Hoffas kids adamant that Sheeran was involved long before Brandt wrote the book?

[Grouchy Sinatra]

for anyone to say Scorsese didn’t try to get some of that magic back with the jokes or the music or the narration then they are fooling themselves.

There was hardly any music and narration compared to Scorsese's past mob films. Goodfellas and Casino were wall to wall music and voice over. So, this film is certainly different in that sense. It depends much more on dialogue.

Besides De Niro, Pacino and Pesci looked tired; Pesci looked like he didn’t wanna even be there.

Can only agree on Pacino. He was not a great Hoffa. Although I'm not sure "tired" is an accurate description. He's jumping out of his armchair and cussing when Robert Kennedy is on television. Pesci and DeNiro were in character. Pesci isn't playing Tommy DeSimone or Tony Spilotro in this one. lol. He's playing Russel Buffalino, who's nicknamed the "Quiet Don". DeNiro plays Sheeran who's a rather reserved figure as well. Hate the concept of Scorsese doing a movie about old mobsters all you will, especially when most of his movies have been centered around relatively young mobsters (Henry Hill, who was out of the life by 40, and Lefty Rosenthal, who was in his 30s and 40s when most of the Casino story takes place...), but you can't knock the actors for playing the characters they're supposed to play

For me it just reminds me that that era and the people in it are all gone, and so with it everything else that came with it.

Which was the point of the film. Exactly what Scorsese has said time and time again, along with his warnings not to expect Goodfellas

The mob movie portraying the golden years is dead.

Safe to say cinema is dead. Just look how Scorsese had to get this film funded. We're living in a time where Hollywood studios are saying no to a Scorsese, DeNiro and Pesci project.

[bert]

I watched the first half, but need break from the boredom
It starts with a soundtrack that never seems to stop. I thought it sucked, Pacino to me was a surprise, I thought he did a good Hoffa. Same type of stuff from his past movies, DeNiro sucks, Pesci is good. The plot is stupid.

They try throwing in every historical person in mob history, Harvey Kietel as Angelo Bruno is the worst casting in the film.

[Grouchy Sinatra]

Oh now the real intelligent critics are coming out of the woodwork...

[bert]

Oh now the real intelligent critics are coming out of the woodwork...

I said it sucked, not as much as you, but it sucked.

[Grouchy Sinatra]

How did you get in to see it anyway? It's R rated.

[mafiastudent]

I watched the first half, but need break from the boredom
It starts with a soundtrack that never seems to stop. I thought it sucked, Pacino to me was a surprise, I thought he did a good Hoffa. Same type of stuff from his past movies, DeNiro sucks, Pesci is good. The plot is stupid.

They try throwing in every historical person in mob history, Harvey Keitel as Angelo Bruno is the worst casting in the film.

I love Harvey Keitel. His and Pesci's performance was the only thing I liked.

If I had to rate the film I'd give it a 3.5/5.0. Besides some technical (and obviously factual things), the story wasn't cohesive. By that I mean that we're supposed to care about his relationship with his daughter and it wasn't teased out enough for me to care.

For example, it made no sense that this guy would've brought his young daughter with him to the grocery store so he could beat the crap out of the guy who pushed her. Why would that be the thing that made her start to question her father? I don't know if it's true or not (other than if he wrote it in the book which I didn't read), but the point is that the relationship between the two wasn't established enough in the movie for me to care.

The ending was horrible and that goes along with that there was nothing that made me care that he had to live his life alone at the end and had isolated everyone. I just didn't care. In fact, all the relationships seemed superficial.

In addition, the relationship between Hoffa and the girl was weird and it seemed to touch on, but didn't go there completely, that there was some sort of romantic relationship between them.

As far as the other stuff, I mean if you're going to portray Joe Gallo into this film, why wouldn't you have put that big mole on the actor's face? That bothered me.

I didn't care for it. In fact, I almost felt like Scorsese was making a mockery out of the book and the ridiculousness of many of the things in the book such as this guy killing Gallo and Hoffa because if you look at the scene at Umberto's it was almost comical the way DeNiro did his thing.

[maxiestern11]

For sheer entertainment value.... I give it an 8 out of 10
For historical “truth”.... I give it a 2-3 out of 10
For best actor.... I give it to Joe Pesci.. he was great!
For an overall mob film, while not a classic like The Godfather or GoodFella’s, it was again a 7-8 out of 10.
.....very good 3.5 hours spent. I thoroughly enjoyed it. But I do not think it lived up to the hype. And will definitely not go down as one of Scorcese’s best work IMO.
-
But again, it’s only a movie. And was not meant to be a history lesson or a 100% accurate depiction of what really happened...... it’s entertainment, period! And I viewed it as such.

[AnIrishGuy]

I'm not sure we should be rating the 'historical truth' aspect of this and nor should we be comparing it to Casino / Goodfellas. There are some nods to them, but those movies are about the glamour of nob life ("As far back as I could remember I always wanted to be a gangster" etc.).

Surely this movie is about the futility of it all and about the regrets a man has when he's left alone. That's definitely a big theme in the book.

If it's a movie about the book, then it's fine and relatively faithful. I thought Pacino was a good Hoffa - I read a biography on the guy and he was a jumpy, shouty, quick-tempered fucker. Well shot, well directed, well done and well worth the Academy Awards that are inevitably coming...