Donnie Brasco Question

I always wondered why they depicted the Three Capos muders as they did in the film. Anyone know why there was no mention of Massino?

there was also no mention of vito rizzuto, sal vitale, or scasccia.

Several times I've watched The History Channel's Greatest Mafia Hits. Tonight they did Donnie Brasco. However, when they came to the part about Brasco going to Florida and setting up the nightclub there, they showed his transportation as a TWA turboprop Constellation. Constellations last flew in the late 60s at the latest. I would think the program's producers would certainly catch something like that. Did anyone else notice?

Is that on voutube?the docu

They did a good job considering everything. Why the hell would Massino, Vitale, Rizzuto be in there? There was a dozen people that were part of that hit, you can't just introduce them all as characters just so one scene can be more true to the real events. Plus the movie was made before Vitale, Massino, etc flipped and less was known about the 3 capos hit.

I consider this to be a good movie, although not completely true to the book. They made Sonny Black to be the main antagonist and generally it felt butchered... almost half of the book was left out of it. Yet you gotta think as a movie producer... you can't include everything, there's only a limited runtime. So, everything considered, this movie came out good.

Yes I noticed the "Super Connie" too and figured the producers were too lazy to find something more appropriate. The 3 capo's murder has been described in many books and it seems no two are alike. Again lazy fact checking.

Lazy fact checking had little to do with it, me thinks. As Malandrino mentioned, the film was made prior to Vitale & Massino flipping, so knowledge about the murders weren't accurate in most cases. In every book I've read about it in, from The Sixth Family to The Five Families by Selwyn Raab, all the descriptions were within the realms of each other, they didn't differ all that much, at least to me. Humphrey's wrote about how Massino invited the three, and Lino, to the J&S cake for a sitdown, and as soon as they got there, the signal was made, the men burst out of the closet, Vito said "This is a holdup", Massino clocked Sonny Red with some object, Trinny rushed and was killed, Lino ran out the back, and Philly Lucky was the only one who didn't fight it and stood against a wall with his hands up until he was popped. It's explained almost identical in the Five Families. I have yet to reach the part where Pistone talks about it in the book, but I can't imagine it being like the scene in the film. I think the directors had an idea of what really went down thanks to Pistone's words about it, but they purposely altered it to fit in with the film and those characters, I think that's why they did it.

The same goes for the scene in which Donnie is labeled a rat, in the film it's Tony Mirra (who isn't featured, just mentioned in the film) claiming he has knowledge of Donnie not being who he says he is, and it's Lefty who's attending the sitdowns and vouching for him and putting his life on the line for him. When the reality of it is, it was Colombo associates who first suspected Pistone of not being who he says he was, and all they did was make some calls and an informant vouched for Pistone as being Donnie Brasco, then Jilly & a guy by the name of Guido squashed it. But it was Jilly who vouched for Pistone during the rat situation, not Lefty Ruggiero.


Another is the relationship and the way they paint Pistone, Lefty & Sonny Black's relationship. The film makes it seem as if it was Lefty who was Pistone's right hand during the entire operation and the guy who had his back and vouched for him for jobs. While he basically was Pistone's overseer for the early part of his infiltration of the Bonanno's, they drifted apart, despite always dealing with each other, and Pistone got closer to Sonny Black and began going over Lefty's head on many situations and instances before the conclusion of the investigation.

Exactly. There were way too many extra guys to throw into the movie to make this like the real thing, plus that scene lets the viewer know that Donnie was in too deep at that point and could have been killed because he was so close to Sonny Black and crew. Plus a big plot like that it would be stupid to add other characters that the viewer would not know into that murder as it would only cause confusion.

Watching Donnie Brasco again today, I heard dialogue that is not correct. Sonny Black tells Santo Trafficante that Donnie is a friend of ours. Certainly the director knew that wasn't correct.

The dialogue in that scene is meant to underscore Lefty's jealousy of Donnie. First Lefty is basically ignored by Santo,then he accuses Donnie of stabbing him in the back.Then Sonny tells Donnie "you're with me now". Sonny introduces Donnie as a friend "of ours" then the camera cuts to Lefty, looking betrayed. There was some dramatic license in the scene,but I think that it was intentional,not a mistake.
Lefty sees himself as Sonny's right hand man,and probably figures that after all of the abuse and disrespect that he has been shown,that he will be a major player under Sonny. Then out of nowhere,Donnie jumps to the front of the line.
The "friend of ours" intro was meant to give the viewers a sympathetic look at Lefty.

You have to expect a lot of fiction in any Hollywood "true stories." I agree with Malandrino that it was a good film. Leaving out Massino was not that big of a deal, as he headed a totally different crew. I do think the movie should have included the whole Tony Mirra saga, though...

Like all movies based on true stories it takes a lot of dramatic liberties. Donnie Brasco is a great movie and does do a decent job being truthful BUT several things are different from the true story. First off the movies starts in late 1978 which isnt accurate. Joe Pistone/Donnie Brasco met Lefty in 1977 and was even his best man to Lefty and his wife Louise wedding in September of that year. Secondly there is no mention of Anthony Mirra who is very important in the true story. The biggest liberty is that in real life Sonny Black and Donnie were actually closer than Donnie and Lefty. Joe Pistone has gone on record saying that he liked Sonny despite trying to put him in jail. Sonny Black was the one who said he understood Donnie was just doing his job and accepted his fate

Well said and agreed.

while the movie was very good. im left wondering how he could have gotten away with that federal boat that he took the crew on.

if it was true then pistone was very lucky, he picked the right family to infiltrate, I don't think he could have gotten away with using a federal boat in any other family, im sure that would have sealed his fate with the genoveses, luchesses, columbos, and gambinos.

I seriously doubt he could have gotten very far with any other family.

"Donnie Brasco" was a thoroughly enjoyable, well-acted movie. But, as others have pointed out, the film took plenty of liberties to make it entertaining. We also have to ask just how truthful Pistone was in his book that was the basis of the movie.

I wish he would have gotten to someone like casso or the Gambino crew members.

Maybe he / they felt Nicky Blacks crew were the more desporate and an easier target.

I had actually met the actor who played Galante in the movie. He told me that they had filmed the scene where Galante was shot but it was cut from the movie. Would have been cool to include more about Galante and the zips in the movie.