Hey guys I'm new to the entire mafia/mob genre, but now that I'm into it I'm hooked. I just saw Goodfellas and I understood the movie, but i have a question about the characters.
Henry said that they don't belong to a family, so what are they then? Is Paulie part of a family and they work for him like a Clemenza character? Or is he just the leader of their gang of people?
You're on the right track pal. Clemenza in the Godfather is a capo or captain of the Corleone Family. Paulie is the same rank in the real life Lucchese Family. Paulie controls a crew of guys in the Mafia known as Made Men. These are the Italians and if you remember Henry says he can't ever be a made man because his father was Irish. So Henry's official rank is an associate of the Lucchese Crime Family. He hung around with Jimmy's crew which were made up of Irish, Italian and I think one of them was even hispanic. This crew were basically all associates to Paulie's crew.
in addition, the Lucchese Family was/is one of the Five crime Families in the syndicate, lead by The Commision.
If you pay attention, you get to know a character named Billy Batts. We know he is from the Gambino crew, also a made member. Gambino is another one of the Five Families. The Families worked apart,but also together.
This can be traced back as far as the early 1930's when The Commision was founded by a mobster called Lucky Luciano.
But I'm getting of track here.
Welcome to the boards, and I suggest you watch other great mob films too... to name a few:
Donnie Brasco Casino The Godfathers Gotti (fair) Road to Perdition
Originally posted by Irish Corleone: I'm still kinda new the ranking of the mob.
there is A LOT to be found just by a quick search on the internet, or perhaps in the "Real Life Crime" forum of this board. some of the members are genuine mafia experts (in the meaning of having seen, read, and thought about every single possible available piece of literature/film/medium ever published on the mob)
