Robert De Niro
James "Jimmy" Conway
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- Living the Dream. “As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster.” — Henry Hill. After watching Tommy DeVito (Pesci) and Jimmy Conway (De Niro) stab and shoot a bloodied Billy Batts (Frank Vincent) in his trunk, Henry (Liotta) slams it shut and doesn’t even blink before being captured in a classic Scorsese freeze frame.
- Baptized by Fire. “One day, some of the kids from the neighborhood carried my mother’s groceries all the way home. You know why? It was outta respect.”
- Only the Strong Survive. “You’re a real jerk. You wasted eight fuckin’ aprons on this guy. I don’t know what the hell’s wrong with you. I gotta toughen this kid up.”
- Snitches Get Stitches. “Never rat on your friends, and always keep your mouth shut.” — Jimmy Conway. A young Henry gets himself pinched for selling cigarettes, but Jimmy isn’t mad—rather, he’s glad for the opportunity to teach his young apprentice the cardinal rule(s) of the wiseguy.
Goodfellas: Directed by Martin Scorsese. With Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta, Joe Pesci, Lorraine Bracco. The story of Henry Hill and his life in the mafia, covering his relationship with his wife Karen and his mob partners Jimmy Conway and Tommy DeVito.
- Tagged: honor code, Rat.
- Tagged: Gun, Mafia, Hybristophilia.
- Tagged: bad guys, Villains.
- Tagged: wiseguys, Cops, dead.
- “As far back as I can remember I always wanted to be a gangster” - Henry Hill. Although it’s not Henry’s first line in Goodfellas, it's the one that serves as the official opening of the movie, and though it’s simple, it serves to establish Henry’s position, especially after Tommy and Jimmy stabbed and shot Billy Batts in the trunk of their car.
- “Funny how? I mean, funny like I'm a clown, I amuse you?” - Tommy DeVito. Arguably, the most famous quote from Goodfellas comes from Tommy DeVito and his volatile personality.
- “Never rat on your friends, and always keep your mouth shut” - Jimmy Conway. Henry’s first arrest happened when he was still a young man running errands for Paulie, as he was caught selling cigarettes.
- “I'm an average nobody. I get to live the rest of my life like a schnook” - Henry Hill. Becoming an FBI informant and joining the witness protection program meant Henry had to leave his life of excess and luxury behind and start over in a much simpler way.
- I Like Going This way...
- You Wasted Eight F****** Aprons on This Guy
- To Me, It Meant Being Somebody in A Neighborhood Full of Nobodies
- F*** You, Pay Me
- You’D Be Late For Your Own F****** Funeral
- They Even Shot Tommy in The Face...
- I Got to Admit The Truth...
- I’m An Average Nobody...
- I’m Gonna Go Get The Papers...
- Hey, Tommy, If I Was Gonna Break Your Balls...
The long tracking shot through the Copacabana found in Goodfellasis one of the most iconic shots in the history of cinema. Henry skips the line, takes Karen into the club through the kitchen, and has a table brought out for them right in front of the stage. It’s easy to see why Karen was seduced by Henry’s lavish lifestyle.
When a man with a gunshot wound collapses on the doorstep of Tuddy’s restaurant, Henry springs into action and starts plugging up the wound with aprons until the man makes it safely into the back of an ambulance. For all intents and purposes, this makes him a hero. But Tuddy doesn’t see it that way; he just sees all the missing aprons. He says, “Yo...
What makes Goodfellas arguably the best mob movie ever madeis that it doesn’t just depict hitmen killing people for mafiosos and gangsters stealing cigarettes out of trucks. It also shows the seductive nature of the mafia lifestyle. We understand exactly why Henry Hill wanted to be a gangster, and why that lifestyle seemed so appealing. When he was...
In voiceover, Henry explains what it’s like to have Paulie as a business partner: “Any problems, he goes to Paulie. Trouble with a bill, he can go to Paulie. Trouble with the cops, deliveries, Tommy, he can call Paulie. But now, the guy’s gotta come up with Paulie’s money every week, no matter what. Business bad? F*ck you, pay me. Oh, you had a fir...
Long before Pulp Fiction would make him an icon, Samuel L. Jackson played a small role as Stacks Edwards in Goodfellas. Instead of ditching the truck that they used in the Lufthansa heist like he was supposed to, Stacks got stoned. So, Tommy goes over to his apartment and tells him to get dressed. But while he’s getting dressed, Tommy says, “You’d ...
Perhaps the most awful moment in the whole of Goodfellas is when Tommy heads to what he thinks is the ceremony in which he’ll be made and gets killed. As Henry explains the whole thing, we get a haunting look and how strictly the mafia stick to their rules: “It was revenge for Billy Batts,and a lot of other things. And there was nothing that we cou...
One of the smartest moves Martin Scorsese made with the writing and directing of Goodfellas was following Karen’s storyline as well as Henry’s. Not only does the movie explore the mentality of someone who ends up being a career criminal; it explores the mentality of someone who gets romantically involved with one. And Lorraine Bracco plays the char...
At the end of Goodfellas, it might seem as though Henry gets off easy by selling out all his friends to the FBI and going into the Witness Protection Program. But as his final voiceover monologue points out, he’s left completely unfulfilled. He had everything he ever wanted and then lost it. Now, he has to live a mundane life in the suburbs like ev...
A commonality among the best crime stories is that they explore how criminals get their nicknames, and it’s usually something pretty trivial. For example, in the very first scene of the very first episode of The Wire, Jimmy McNulty launches into a monologue about how a kid was given a beautiful name by his mother and then one day, just because he f...
Joe Pesci’s character Tommy DeVito has a contentious relationship with pretty much everybody, but none more than Billy Batts. Billy knows that Tommy is a hothead and he likes to push his buttons. Tommy asks him politely,“Just don’t go bustin’ my balls, Billy, okay?” RELATED: Goodfellas: Every Major Performance, Ranked And then Billy says, “Hey, Tom...
Jan 26, 2020 · Through extraordinary talent and well-developed research, Scorsese was able to deliver an excellent film, one that has become an icon of the gangster genre. In this article, we’re going to look at the best quotes from Goodfellas and briefly explain the context and importance of each.
Our list of the best quotes from crime drama Goodfellas (1990) directed and co-written by Martin Scorsese, based on the non-fiction novel “Wiseguy” by Nicholas Pileggi, which centers on small time gangster, Henry Hill (Ray Liotta), who grows up in the mob and follows his relationship with his wife, Karen (Lorraine Bracco), and his mob ...
