The Irishman is Scorsese’s best gangster film
It’s finally here. After being delayed for over a year and being sold from Paramount to Netflix due to massive budget overruns, all 209 minutes of The Irishman are in theaters. It was well worth the wait. Based on the book I Heard You Paint Houses by Charles Brandt, Martin Scorsese’s ninth collaboration with Robert De Niro (and somehow first with Al Pacino) follows the life and career of Frank Sheeran, a hitman climbing his way through the ranks of the mob and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
The sweeping crime epic covers about fifty years of Sheeran’s life, necessitating the use of de-aging CGI to show De Niro as a spry young 40-something. Given the recent poor execution of this same technology on Will Smith in Gemini Man, I was pleasantly surprised with the results here. It’s a bit distracting at first, but you get used to it quickly.
The film has the feel of Goodfellas and Casino but with a stronger focus on life after crime (not that it shies away from the crime itself). The Irishman is full of jarring acts of violence, but it also takes time to examine the damaging effects on those around it. De Niro gives a devastating performance of a man whose years of violence in the military and the mafia have left him dead inside, barely capable of experiencing human emotion. Pacino and Pesci are great too, but it’s really De Niro’s movie.
Aided by Thelma Schoonmaker’s skillful editing and Rodrigo Prieto’s impeccable tracking shots, the film moves along quickly and doesn’t feel like three and a half hours. Robbie Robertson’s intense, drum-heavy score sets the film at a high tempo and keeps the audience on edge throughout. Don’t let the long runtime scare you off.
The movie gets better as it goes along, reaching its emotional peak as Frank rots in a nursing home contemplating the choices he’s made, their ramifications on his relationships, and his prospects in the afterlife. One of the most moving scenes features a young priest trying to convince Frank to repent of his sins. Frank responds that he doesn’t feel sorry for anything he’s done in his life. Violence has created callouses on his soul that he’s unable to shed even in the face of death.
As Sheeran looks back at his life, you can sense Scorsese doing the same. He’s not the violent menace that Frank was, but you can feel him dealing with his own guilt and wondering if he’s done enough with his life or whether any of it actually matters. Scorsese has analyzed guilt and Catholicism throughout his career, but it feels more poignant now. At 76 years old, he’s grappling with his mortality and acknowledging that the majority of his life is behind him. He has to live with the consequences of his choices, and there’s not much he can do to change them now.
The Irishman is Scorsese’s most personal gangster film since Mean Streets, and it’s pretty damn great. I highly recommend seeing it in a theater rather than waiting for it to hit Netflix at the end of the month. It’s one of the best films of the decade, and it deserves to be seen on the biggest screen you can find.
Updated Scorsese Gangster Movie Rankings
1. The Irishman
2. The Wolf of Wall Street
3. Mean Streets
4. Casino
5. The Departed
6. Goodfellas
7. Gangs of New York
Michael Dixon is a mild mannered accountant by day and a mild mannered movie watcher by night. He will not do your taxes for you. He lives in Austin, Texas with his lovely television and collection of fine whiskies. You can’t purchase his book anywhere because it doesn’t exist.
