Based on a one-man play written by the film's star Chazz Palminteri; this film is a coming-of-age story set in 1960 at the Bronx that follows the life of a young Italian American boy named Calogero Anello (Francis Capra) who lives in a small apartment with his family, that happens to be right next to a bar where the local mobsters hang-out and do business. Calogero admires his Father Lorenzo (Robert De Niro), but he idolizes the mobster who practically controls the neighborhood Sonny (Chazz Palminteri). One day Calogero witnesses a murder committed by Sonny in defense for a friend at his neighborhood. The NYPD detectives come knocking at the Anello family's door to question Calogero if he recognizes any of the suspects that may have committed the crime. Calogero chooses to keep quiet and is later befriended by Sonny for his action, giving him the nickname "C". Lorenzo disapproves of their friendship fearing for his son's well-being, confronts Sonny warning him to stay away from C (I'm just going to call the lead C from here on out because Calogero is "a big name"). 8 years later, a grown-up C (Lillo Brancato) still hangs out with Sonny, as he grows distant from his Father. Eventually, C comes across a black girl named Jane (Taral Hicks) who falls in love with her but is worried about the racial tensions if he should ever go out with her. C's friends from childhood have also been becoming a bad influence on him for evolving into a gang of wanna-be mobsters who start attacking people of color that enter their segregated neighborhood.
Last year when I talked about another coming-of-age movie at the time that was held together by an actor making his directorial debut "The Man without a Face"; the main factors that made it so rich was the main characters and their relationships with each other, that was backed-up by thoughtful solid writing and strong performances. "A Bronx Tale" magnificently offers all those strengths! C does not have one but two mentors, being his Father and the neighborhood gangster where it may seem that one character and performance out of the two is going to outshine the other, but it turns out that they are both equally fascinating. Lorenzo is the common working man who doesn't have much money but still makes enough to provide for his family and take part in special activities together if he can spare some extra cash. To him as low-key and hard as his life is, he's still happy with the path he's chosen, who feels that the working man is the real tough guy. Sonny, on the other hand, is the big-shot gangster who is respected by everyone in the neighborhood, and though he wouldn't want to ever turn down the life he leads, he's not fully happy with it either. Everybody around him fears him than they do genuinely love being around him, and by acknowledging that everyone around him is phonies, the only person he can ever depend on is himself. These two men both live polar-opposite lives who respect each other but are always at war when regarding C's best interest fearing that he may be led down the wrong path for how they both differ. Lorenzo wants C to make an honest living by using his talent to his advantage, while Sonny is teaching him street smarts without being a hoodlum like himself. They clearly don't want C to fail in life, it's just one doesn't want to see him be an everyday sucker, as the other doesn't want him to wield a gun to achieve his desire. They just both happen to be the person that they don't want to see him turn into and are always fighting each other because of their differences, despite that they both have their own good points that they fail to acknowledge from their prejudices and beliefs.
The protagonist in the center of this rivalry grasping each piece of advice from both of his mentors is a character that many of us can relate to. As a kid, we relate to his curiosity and innocence through how he obsesses over a bar where the gangsters’ chill that's considered to be forbidden fruit to him, as he views Sonny as a famous movie star who he hopes to one day be just like. And as a teenager, we connect to his struggles of making the right choices down a path that leads to complete uncertainty, as he's always being peered pressured by his friends and society that will easily bring him to rock-bottom if he's not careful. Both performances when capturing C's character feel very naturalistic, as his relationship with the people around him and tries to absorb the lessons he's being taught are fully believable where the speeches he's given from the people opposite of him don't feel preachy or being played-up as Oscar bait. I will admit however that as great of a performance that both actors give for C, I feel that he's more interesting as a kid than he is when he gets older. When we see him as a kid, while being innocent and naive, he had a bit of a tough wise guy side to him that made him interesting. He was rebellious, he was snarky, and then when we see him get older he loses that edge where he comes across as weak and a bit whiny. He just seems more defenseless as an adult than he did as a kid. But as I said before, Brancato still gives a good performance that makes you still feel attached to him for how down-to-earth his performance is. I just wish that we didn't lose a good part of what made him so relatable.
There is at least one special thing that Brancato offers that Capra doesn't have, and that's the narration he provides for the film. When hearing him reminisce the past, and the thoughts that he was thinking at the time, it sounds as personal as listening to Ray Liotta narrate the lifestyle of mobsters in "Goodfellas", or Gene Shepherd as a grown-up Ralphie reflect on his childhood memories in "A Christmas Story". A huge reason why the narration, as well as the relationship and lessons in the film, connect to the audience on a personal level is that the story is mostly based on Chazz Palminteri's childhood. From having a working Father who would give him the same advice that Lorenzo would in the film, to dating a black girl, to knowing mobsters with funny nicknames, to having the name Calogero, and even down to witnessing a murder while sitting on his stoop, a lot of the events that happened in the film are similar and sometimes exact to the memories that Palminteri's once had. And his nostalgic passion for translating it to a screenplay to offer a story that's deep and compelling for viewers to take away from it consistently shows from start to finish. As a matter of fact, Palminteri cherished the story so much for how personal it is to him that he turned down several studios that offered him big money, for not letting him write the screenplay and play Sonny. It only took a famous actor who wanted to try something different, showing no problems with meeting Palminteri's demands and giving him more than what he asked for by letting him get involved with almost every single piece of production. So as we're watching the two go at each other on-screen, off-screen De Niro wanted Palminteri close-by to do justice to his material, making it clear that his involvement is just as important as De Niro directing it.
DeNiro, Palminteri, Capra, and Brancato, aren't the only people giving a great performance in the movie because the casting itself is as pitch-perfect as a film can be. The supporting characters may not be as complex or well-rounded as the leads, but the actors hired to portray these characters provide the energy, charm, and mannerisms that are required for the role. The actors cast as C's group of delinquent friends (both young and old) perfectly balance out their humorous moronic wise guy personalities while still feeling threatening for being bigoted loose cannons. But as much as you want to see C back-away from these degenerate scumbags, you still see him bonding with them as friends, providing the viewer to understand and feel why he can't simply just back-away from them. Taking care of C when his Father is out driving the bus, is his Mother played by Kathrine Narducci (who would later play Artie Bucco's wife on "The Sopranos") who shares the same believable chemistry with the family, as DeNiro does with the actors playing C. You get the sense that she genuinely cares for her son, and loves her husband dearly. But as much as she loves her family, sometimes she'll question Lorenzo's decision regarding money being offered to him by Sonny given their living conditions which is understandable. It really bothers me that once we reach 1968 she fades away from existence without a trace, because she did help bring a realism to the family that felt nice and would've been interesting to see how she feels about her son during certain situations. The best of the supporting characters in the film is without a doubt the mobsters working for Sonny just for how colorful they are like Tony Toupee, Frankie Coffeecake. The funniest character in the gang is Eddie Mush, a gambler who always loses, who interestingly enough is played by the actual guy that the character is based on Eddie Montanaro, who was still a "jinx" after all these years. For all I know, this film was probably the luckiest thing that has ever happened to him. And as if this mob can't get any wilder, Joe Pesci giving one of the best performances in his career makes an important appearance.
As the film explores the relationships with family, friends, the film still has enough room to add in a romance. The idea of adding a romance may sound like a forced diversion from the main relationships in order to give a little something to female audiences who are taken to see it with their mobster film loving boyfriends, but it doesn't. Whenever this subplot comes into play, I don't find it to slow the film down, or be uninteresting because the romance is one of the conflicts in the film that puts C's lessons to the test. C is surrounded in an environment full of pure hatred and bigotry between Italians and African Americans, with friends that will take any chance they get to bash in the opposing races' skull, and a Father who gets along with the races but is still prejudiced. However, though Lorenzo doesn't approve the idea, he lets C go ahead with his date as long as he carefully thinks about his choices, while Sonny tells him not to miss his chance regardless what people think as long as he doesn’t let her take advantage of him. Knowing the racial tensions and trying to protect his heart from being played for a sap, it is up to C to carefully think if going out with a colored girl is worth going for based on the lessons he learned from his mentors without them interfering. And the film does a brutally effective job of establishing the racial intolerance of the time regarding both races, causing you to feel the challenges and risks regarding C from stepping out of his comfort zone. But as heavy as the obstacles are, you root for C to man-up and fight against it for how sweet of a girl Jane is, and how authentic they bond together. And I'm not just writing it either, the way the two interact feels as highly realistic as the rest of the relationship of the film to the point where you want to see them together for how much they make for a good couple (it always bothered me that we don't know what became of them after the events in the film however, that's how much I enjoy their chemistry).
Knowing that DeNiro is the man behind the camera putting the film together, it surprises me how fantastic of a job he does. As soon as the film starts, you suddenly begin to feel that you've entered C's memory of his neighborhood in the Bronx, through his narration as we pass by all the important places in the area on a beautiful summer night, and from here on out you never quite feel distant from feeling like you're inside C's memory. Watching C bond with his Father on the bus, shooting dice with Sonny and the gang, and see him roam streets of the Bronx bring a fun and sentimental sense of nostalgia. they show that De Niro understands that these little happy memories should remain as little happy memories without feeling the need to emphasize the joy where they seem corny, or making the comedy silly to the point where it works against the constant drama surrounding the film. But when a scene calls for intense suspense and violence, De Niro provides the brutal reality that it deserves. The scene when C witnesses' Sonny murdering man makes you feel that you're watching this random act of violence from C's point of view, for its fast pacing, graphic violence, and its use of slow-mo near the end of the scene when Sonny looks at him. A big reason why the scene is so intense is because the imagery is supposed to mirror the exact memory of how Palminteri remembered witnessing the murder in real-life, so given that he helped De Niro with the film it would seem plausible that the two worked together as best as they could to recreate this childhood trauma considering that it's the key point in the story. Shortly after the scene, the tension heightens again when C is taken with the detectives to a line-up of mobsters to tell them which one of them did it. Even when knowing that C isn't going to rat out Sonny, the tension constantly builds from the slow pacing, Lorenzo looking nervous, the clever editing, and the shots of the mobsters faces that seem like that they're staring right at you! If you're expecting the film to have tons of scenes of people beating each other up and shooting one another, you're not going to see too much of that here. Most of the violence is usually focused on C's friends terrorizing people of color that are handled as depressingly disturbing as one would imagine. The only real violent scene in the whole film that stands-out as badass entertainment is when Sonny and his men take on a bunch of bikers who plan to trash their bar, as everything else is more shocking and upsetting. But as little action there is, apart from there being enough of it, it makes me glad that De Niro doesn't try to flood the film with it, because this isn't the kind of gangster film that has to drop constant F-bombs, and throw some kind of graphic violence at you after at least 5 minutes to give you a feel of danger in the life of a gangster. The focus of it is on C and how he perceives life and grows from it through the people he knows in his neighborhood.
The music in the film also plays a big factor in capturing its environment. The score by Butch Barbella does an excellent job with capturing the mood for scenes involving drama, but it's really the use of original songs that make most of the scenes work so magnificently. Much like how George Lucas or Martin Scorsese would use songs to the set tone, setting, and tie into the story; De Niro understands the concept of using songs in the picture as well as he knows how to visually tell a story. Let's take the time setting for example. The film starts out in 1960 when Doo-Wop was still going strong and everything still felt like the 50s, to help capture its period feel as we watch the people in C's neighborhood carry on with their daily actives while the opening credits' role, we hear the song "I Wonder Why" sung by Dion and the Belmonts that perfectly matches the visuals when depicting the era (my favorite bit is how the game of stickball is in sync with the "wop" part of the song). Then later on as the film flashes forward to 1968 when the 50s was no more and the 60s is at its peak, the 60s pop song "It's a Beautiful Morning" performed by The Rascals is heard to embrace a new era while we gaze up at the clouds before the camera pans down to the race track where C and Sonny are making bets. The use of songs are also carried out to identify the characters backgrounds. When the biker gang shows up at the bar to cause trouble believing that they're the new tough guys around, The Beatles song "Come Together" is heard, until Sonny and his men beat them causing the song to stop and replaced with a 50s Do-Wop tune "Ten Commandments of Love" by the Moonglows, proving that these old school mobsters are still tough and not out of style. If I had any criticism with the use of songs, I do find it a bit confusing that C's bigoted friends are listening to music performed by black artists. I guess you could argue that this is supposed to represent the hypocrisy of racism, seeing how dumb racist white people at the time will listen to black artists as entertainment despite being highly prejudiced, which I guess is accurate, but in terms of the characters of C's friends, I don't know. They obviously seem like the kind of people who would join the KKK if they had the chance given how much they hate black people, and I don't believe that people who are so gung-ho with spreading hate and terror to another race through violence are the kind of people who would blast Jimi Hendrix in their car, or casually listen to Aaron Neville at the place where they hang. I will also admit that as grand of a job that De Niro does putting the film together, his style does feel a little too similar to Scorsese's. The urban environment, the narration, the rock soundtrack, and especially the violence hits a little too close to films like "Goodfellas" and "Mean Streets". As we go around the bar meeting all the mobsters, I keep expecting to see the mobsters waving at the camera, and Jimmy Two Times to enter the frame at any moment. And when I view some shots of the bikers getting trampled on, I start seeing a few flashbacks of Billy Batts getting the beating of his life. I'm not saying that these similarities are distracting and don't make the film stand on its own, I'm just simply implying that when Scorsese's number 1 actor (before DiCaprio) is given a shot to direct a film the odds seem likely that he's going to use similar techniques after spending so much time with him that gave them both a successful career, where the influence does show.
OVERALL THOUGHTS
Despite De Niro borrowing a lot from Scorsese, he shows that he can be just as great of a director as he is an actor, which disappoints me that he only directed one other movie in his directing career that isn't as memorable or successful as "A Bronx Tale" is. The sole reason why the movie is so admirable is that it's not a gangster film that's focused on the typical cliches as it tries to aim to be a big and epic masterpiece as a film like "The Godfather". It's a very small and down to earth film that combines the style of "Goodfellas" and the sentimental realism of how "The Godfather" captured the relationships, into a coming-of-age story written by a guy who wanted to teach people the things that he learned from life to make the film experience reach and inspire the viewer on a personal level. Because of this, the relationships don't feel forced for how relatable they are, as the lessons are thoughtful and handled maturely as opposed to feeling preachy. It's a story with tons of heart, that's backed-up by charming performances, cinematography that puts you into the perspective of C's memories of the past, clever use of songs, shocking and at times entertaining use of violence, and plenty of moments that can be funny, lighthearted, dramatic, and depressing. Unfortunately, if you're a US citizen who is looking to purchase the film on Blu-ray you're not going to have a chance unless you can track down an out of print DVD copy, or an old VHS of the film if you still own a VCR. You can definitely rent and purchase the film on Amazon Prime, but in terms of owning a physical copy, the chances are slim. I really do hope that it does someday get a Blu-ray release available in the US because it's a film that deserves to be on the shelves than just being viewed online. In my opinion, there's nothing better than owning something that you can actually touch and place than relying on a piece of equipment to store it for you. And if it does get a Blu-ray release, let’s hope that it contains some fascinating special features.
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