1973 110 mins

dir. Martin Scorsese

stars - Robert De Niro - Johnny Boy Cervello
Harvey Keitel - Charlie
David Proval - Tony
Amy Robimson - Teresa
Richard Romanus - Michael

Written and directed by Martin Scorsese, Mean Streets was his attempt to portray life in his Little Italy neighbourhood in New York, a kind of biography if you like using events and things that he saw whilst he was growing up and I think that if you keep this in mind whilst watching Mean Streets you can appreciate what Scorsese was trying to do and for the most part he achieves this.

Mean Streets tells the story of Charlie who is torn between doing the right thing for his uncle by getting his restraunt up and running, his relationship with his girlfriend Teresa and keeping her tear away cousin Johnny Boy safe from the neighbourhood wiseguys to whom he owes money and we see how he handles the guilt that these conflicting interests cause him.

De Niro brings a lot of prescence to the screen in this early role and gives a performance that made people take notice of him back in the early seventies and from Mean Streets onwards he never looked back because it launched his career.

This is a hell of a cool film for one of Scorsese's first films it's very stylish and if you are a fan of the genre I think you will enjoy it. You're a mook if you don't.

BBM

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