Mean Streets

MOVIE #1,560 • 🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿 • 04.22.24 𝑀𝒶𝓇𝓉𝓎: A MARTIN SCORSESE DIRECTOR FOCUS 🇮🇹🇺🇸 Just got back from a week vacation with the family (Easter in Raleigh and then a night in Savannah before four days in Orlando). I watched two movies in those nine days and boy oh boy am I glad to be back “at the movies” here in New Jersey (lovely this time of year — I’m writing this mere minutes before the solar eclipse is supposed to begin on the 8th of April). One of the films I watched on my cheapo Kindle Fire and headphones before bed in the hotel was Scorsese’s first ‘real deal’ effort, his 1973 crime hangout movie, Mean Streets. I know this isn’t quite a true hangout movie but it hits enough notes. It’s at least best appreciated that way (imo).

I actually watched this one ages ago and my memory of it was vastly different from it actually is: a deep and morose character study of troubled and troubling people on the titular and very authentic mean streets of an amazing-looking New York City of the 70s. It’s dripping with the themes of Scorcese’s entire career, most notably the tortured Catholicism embodied through Kietel’s lead role. It’s one of the rare times I wish I had experienced the viewing in a more pristine setting (split over three nights on a tiny screen with the hotel TV on in the background is not how Marty or anyone who appreciates cinema intended this to be seen).

I just looked directly at the sun through a strainer spoon with two pairs of sunglasses (one of them a set of 3D I stole from the Kung Fu Panda movie that I took the kids to recently) and I still think I hurt my peepers (and nothing’s really happening yet).

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CHRONOLOGICALLY
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Mean Streets is a 1973 American crime drama film directed by Martin Scorsese, co-written by Scorsese and Mardik Martin, and starring Robert De Niro and Harvey Keitel. It was produced by Warner Bros. The film premiered at the New York Film Festival on October 2, 1973, and was released on October 14. De Niro won the National Society of Film Critics and the New York Film Critics Circle award for Best Supporting Actor for his role as "Johnny Boy" Civello. It was released on October 14, 1973.