The more I watch this the more I realize that this was the movie Scorsese wanted to make when he did Casino.
In Casino he gives Ace Rothstein a somewhat positive ending. Mean Streets, Goodfellas, and Casino didn't really go into the aftermath of the lead characters. They end just as the party's over. They don't go into the loneliness and despair. Raging Bull sort of does but it's also not necessarily a mob movie. And as far as we can see, "Tommy Como" or any of his associates go on to business as usual, perhaps die peaceful deaths off screen.
The Irishman was the first gangster film Scorsese really got to make where he had an hour to deep dive into the sad decay of a former wiseguy, where all their friends are dead and their families won't have anything to do with them because of their past.
I wonder if Scorsese didn't bother using a stunt double in these scenes where DeNiro physically looks old for this very reason. Even though he's portraying a young man in some of these scenes, his old posture foreshadows his meek status in life at the end of the film.
The Irishman is an end of life film. You can see the progression from his earlier films where, slowly but surely, the life doesn't look so attractive anymore. No comeuppance for Michael or Giovanni in Mean Streets or even Salvi or Tommy in Raging Bull. Then again, maybe Scorsese didn't feel they needed it because they weren't written as being totally ruthless or crazy. Then we get to Pesci's characters in Goodfellas and Casino. Both pyscho monsters who are cut down in their prime as a result of their actions. Neither death was sad, although both were brutal. But at almost 80 years old, I think Scorsese was finally ready to approach a life full lived for these guys, and it wasn't pretty. I honestly felt nothing for Sheeran in the film (much like his daughter). But I DID feel for the Bufalino character, although he was every bit the murderer that Sheeran was. Watching him in prison got me to sympathize with him. But at the end of the day, if Bufalino had ordered the death of a loved one, I'd more than likely say fuck him, let him rot like Manson. The film was a great character study on aging with guilt and regret.
