The story of a group of friends in turn of the century New York, from their early days as street hoods to their rise in the world of organized crime. As their crime empire expands, they have to deal with many problems, including their own differing opinions on how to run their business, the local Godfather, and the psychotic Mad Dog Coll.
An unusual cast of characters whom I wouldn't have pegged as making good mob figures, but I've been known to be wrong on more than one occassion. My biggest surprise was Christian Slater, who towards the beginning of the film, thought wouldn't pull off a good Italian/Mafioso. When I heard him talking with adding an 'a' to every word, I thought it might have been a long ride. However, once we got out of the neighborhood and youth scenes he was fine. Patrick Dempsey was also a surprise, however he was playing a Jewish character not an Italian and I think he did as good if not a better job than Slater.
My biggest beef with the film was the casting of Michael Gambon as Don Salvatore Faranzano. His English accent stuck out like a sore thumb whenever he spoke. Anthony Quinn was great Don Giuseppe 'Joe the Boss' Masseria. It's a pity I haven't seen more of his work and they should have casted someone else to play his rival to help balance his workload out (he carried both Don roles pretty much). As for the story, I thought it was a very interesting look at independent gangsters who don't belong to anyone family. It was interesting because they only had ties to themselves and could fool the families into fighting over them and to fight each other.
