2019 In Review: The Irishman

Once Upon A Time In The Mob

“You don’t feel anything at all?”
“Water under the dam.”

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As always, please forgive the long, irrelevant word-vomit and run-on sentences. 

To those who stick around, you are the reason I ramble.

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*Spoilers Throughout*

The Irishman is Martin Scorsese’s swan song to gangster films, and it is not just one of the best mob movies ever made, but one of the most sobering reflections of betrayal and melancholy ever documented on film.

  Though underwhelming in appearance, the flick is a significant slow burn with payoff not in action, but in remorse. An ode to meat truck driver turned mobster Frank Sheeran, as well as an adaptation of the non-fiction book, I Heard You Paint Houses, the retelling of Sheeran’s life, The Irishman may be met with responses such as “It’s no Goodfellas,” but despite this being a Scorsese-De Niro mob movie, it should not be treated like Goodfellas. It’s a gangster movie filled with deception and murder, but this is also a quiet, somber picture that’s fueled by melancholic nostalgia. If anything The Irishman feels like a grand finale of sorts for Scorsese himself.

  By reuniting with Robert De Niro, bringing Joe Pesci out of retirement, and introducing Al Pacino to his resume, Scorsese has delivered his own send-off to not just legendary actors such as these, but to the entire genre of gangster films. Sure this won’t be the last we see of a mob movie, but shot with such endearing finality, and at a meaty 209 minutes, the weight of The Irishman alone feels like the end of an era, and to a degree, this film is the last of its kind.

  Shot with an intimate amount of detail, the film spends every second baking the audience into each individual moment, from the slow drag of a cigarette to the abrupt killing of a corrupter, so that we’re not just watching the world Marty has built, but living in an entire era.

  From the opening fade into the retirement home, staged nostalgically to The Five Satins’ In The Still of the Night, The Irishman leads the audience as visitors down the corridors of time, as Scorsese preheats his epic. Through Frank Sheeran, Marty guides us (via De Niro’s old-timer narration juxtaposed with controversial de-aging CGI) along three different timelines. 

  Sheeran tells his story like an old boomer sharing wild tales from his past to an inspired generation of grandchildren listening to the unfolding of an entire man’s life to the screen, young age to old. With this narrative structure, Sheeran’s reminiscing of his relationships with the mob brings an even grander scale of depth, as we hear his and only his point of view.

  When taking into account how much historical significance Sheeran’s presence had during the 1970s, even the entire idea of accepting Frank’s story as absolute truth becomes a factor, but just as Quentin Tarantino redesigned the Manson-Tate murders in Once Upon A Time In Hollywood, Scorsese takes just as much liberation in skewing the truth in order to structure not just a better narrative, but a captivating story.

  In this light of twisting historical facts in order to serve the foundation of a great film, both Scorsese’s and Tarantino’s latest films are intertwined in fictionalizing non-fiction; to tell the story not in the way that it happened, but in the way we want it to happen; in the way that makes for a more satisfying film, the glaring difference here being Sheeran, as his version of the truth (notably in the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa) is not just much more dark, but far more plausible. 

  What allows Sheeran’s recounting of his time spent with both the mob and political activists, as well as Scorsese’s efforts to bake the audience in these relationships, to be as compelling as they are is in the believability of their story. The most disheartening element in Sheeran’s tale is in how he betrayed not just a genuine friend, but a mentor, and fundamental figure in his life.

  As with any great mob movie, The Irishman pins two parties against each other, but Scorsese’s film also takes its sweet time in evolving the beef between such parties, as to earn true satisfaction of the audience. By painting the houses of relationships that Sheeran had with the Buffalino family, primarily mob boss Russell Buffalino (Pesci), Scorsese flips through history like skimming an old family photo album, page by page. 

  We learn to not just appreciate the dynamics, but we grow to fear them. We see the fashion in the family gatherings; the discreet dispatching of those who double-cross the Buffalinos; the brutality of how quick and clean the murders are. Russell Buffalino becomes one of the most menacing on-screen characters of 2019, and done so strictly through word of mouth. In one of the most dialed back performances of his career, Joe Pesci exerts such a quiet presence, he’s a threat without hardly lifting a finger. Even just the way he speaks quietly about “doing what they gotta do” is often more chilling than watching a man get a bullet to the back of the head. It’s that unpredictable silence which makes for the best kind of character in a gangster movie.

  Granted all this from Sheeran’s point of view, we are left to question as to how bad Buffalino was in real life. Even with all the buildups of the family, the story ends up being more about Hoffa than about Buffalino, and Hoffa isn’t even introduced until nearly an hour into the film. Scorsese is just so good at setting up his story, that the runtime becomes a character in itself.

  Pacino plays Hoffa like an angry Pacino (like an old Scarface but a bit toned down), but also infectiously tense in his own manner, from the boisterous political speeches, down to the silent fashion in which he nonchalantly goes back to eating his ice cream upon learning of JFK’s assassination. Pacino plays his own quiet threat against Pesci like a fiddle, and his chemistry with both him and De Niro is the stuff of gold; the kind of dynamic you wish there could be more screen time of with the three of them, but Scorsese milks their time together with just enough severance to build nail-splitting tension.

  By pinning Sheeran between such two Goliaths of control, Scorsese unveils Frank’s thinning humanity. In receiving honorary gifts such as the watch from Hoffa, the ring from Buffalino, Sheeran holds these father-figures close to his heart which inevitably dwindles down to his remorse in their division and in Hoffa’s ultimate demise. With Buffalino having Sheeran be the one to whack Hoffa, there’s a sense of poetically dark finality to Sheeran’s empathy.

  Even in how deeply Hoffa becomes involved, it’s nearly impossible to not see the end coming, but in a power move that only someone like Scorsese could pull, the ending is not in Hoffa’s death, but with Sheeran’s life; his ever fiber whittled down to a sad, old man, alone in a retirement home. In a sense; in many ways, Scorsese’s epic about a fraction of political drama in time, was never about an era, but a reflection of an entire life.

  When looking deep into the tragedy of Frank Sheeran, and the withering resilience in the way De Niro portrays him, Scorsese’s mob movie is no longer exciting, but heavy; heartbreaking. We see a man torn between two mentors, we watch him grow old, we witness everyone around him slowly die. As he approaches death, he asks a young doctor if she knew about Jimmy Hoffa, a man claimed to have as much fame as The Beatles, and she has no idea who he was. A priests asks Sheeran if he has regret. He has none. “Water under the dam,” he says.

  Even the estranged relationship Sheeran has with his daughter Peggy (Anna Paquin); the way in which she alienates him for his actions; the bold and poignant choice to keep Paquin quiet, with silent resentment, it’s powerful because it’s real. The truth lies not in Sheeran’s story, but within his melancholy, and with that kind of haunting presence, Scorsese leaves the audience the exact way he leaves Sheeran in the final shot of the film; a small frame peering in at an old man at the end of his rope. It’s a send off to not just a story, but to Marty himself. 

In a sense The Irishman feels like closing a book on Scorsese’s entire career, and with that kind of weight the film becomes more than the end of a great mob epic. It also represents the end of an era, and for that, its impact lies far greater than our own understanding.

* 100 points to Marty 

* 50 points to the big three