Martin Scorsese’s newest gangster flick, The Irishman, is streamed on Netflix from today, and it comes with big guns. The movie is based on the real life of mob hitman Frank “The Irishman” Sheeran (Robert De Niro) from the 1950s to the early 2000s. It traces his relationship with two of his bosses Russell Bufalino (Joe Pesci) and Jimmy Hoffa (Al Pacino). While this Irishman puts the cosa nostra first, his relationship with his own family deteriorates drastically.
It’s everything that a gangster movie should be. There are guns, violence, Italian mobsters and all the nasty underbelly that we all love to watch. If you liked Goodfellas, you will definitely like this.
Scorsese uses different filters depending on the era, to give the audience a 50s, 80s or 00s vibe. Besides time travel, we are taken on a journey to different locations across the USA. The de-ageing technology used on De Niro, Pesci and Pacino takes a couple of scenes to get used to, but after that it is barely noticeable. There are strong performances from all three. Pacino is explosive, Pesci is menacing – keeping the audience guessing, but De Niro is tops: he lets you into his character’s mind. You can feel everything that Frank is feeling, and you know exactly what he is thinking and what he is about to do, thanks to De Niro acting as the medium for his character.
Far more than a gangster flick The Irishman is also a crime history of America: it shows how these people affected the country and how the country was influenced by crime families. It also has comical moments, where characters are just having normal conversations that drift into the absurd. It’s a great way to lighten up a movie that is mainly focused on killing people. And some lightening up is definitely necessary in a film that lasts three-and-a-half hours.
The Irishman made me think: it made me realise that people often only realise what they are doing when it is too late to do anything else. Of course, Martin Scorsese always knows what he’s up to and with a dream cast like this, I can’t avoid giving The Irishman a 9/10.
