SS —— << LL Reviews Nasty story told / well by Scorsese GOODFELLAS. With Robert De Niro, Ray Liotta, Joe Pesci, Lorraine Bracco. Directed by Martin Scorsese. At Famous Players theatres. “It’s nothing personal. It’s just business.” That immortal line from the Godfather series of films came to sum up the perception of the central tenet of organized crime in America. The words were associated with killing, gangland style, and they offered a curious kind of comfort: I may be doing you in, but it has nothing to do with any shortcomings on your part; in fact, I even like you. Pow! Thus uttered, the sentences created anew myth about a subculture while liberating audiences from B-movie concepts of gangsters. Killing for profit became almost justified because it operated under a kind of code of honour, and almost sanitized the Mafia’s heinous acts. Reinstating the psychopathology into the goings-on of the underworld seems to be the task of GoodFellas, director Martin Scorsese’s contribution to what threatens to be a re-growth of a genre. (The current Miller’s Crossing is also about gang war- fare; Godfather Part III is imminent. We suffered through The Untouchables a few years back.) In GoodFellas, people do kill for personal gain; but they also murder on the slightest provocation, proving that the line between the different motivations for murder is slim indeed, if not non-existent. You’ve got to be truly crazy to do what these guys do. Scorsese grew up in a Brooklyn neigh- bourhood like that depicted in this film, the latest in a kind of series about the privations and degradations of life in New York and its boroughs (others include Mean Streets and Taxi Driver). Violent and profane, the writer-director’s films have none the less garnered critical acclaim for their social Queen Ida band plays - Concert: It’s a late notice, ‘but those folkies who get this in time will know that former Pentangle members Bert Jansch and John Renbourne appear together at the Vancouver East Cultural Centre on Tuesday, Nov. 6, 8 p.m. The two guitarists blend folk, jazz, blues and even clas- sical for a unique sound that has in- fluenced acoustic music for three decades. Presented by the Vancouver Folk Music Festival. Also by the festival is the upcom- ing concert of Queen Ida and the Bon Temps Zydeco Band. Cajun music extrordinaire at the Com- modore Ballroom in Vancouver on Friday, Nov. 16, 8:30 p.m. (when the doors open). Tickets are $18 at the festival office (879-2931) or Ticket- master (280-4444). Records: The folk music festival holds its fourth annual recorded music Sale, this year entitled, apocalyptical- ly, “the death of vinyl.” It looks like it’s curtains for those 12-inch disks in the era of CDs and cassettes, say the organizers, who point out many of the records will be unavailable in the fu- ture. Discounts range between one- third to one-half off. At the festival office, 3271 Main St., Nov. 15-17, 10 a.m.-9 p.m. realism and first-rate acting, on the way making a mega-star out of Scorsese’s long- time friend, Robert De Niro. A cinematic rendering of journalist Nicholas Pileggi’s book Wiseguy, Good- Fellas relates the true story of a man who moved up through the underworld from the time he first began running errands for the local mafia as a teenager in the mid-Fifties. Portrayed effectively by relative newcomer Ray Liotta, he is less the crazed killer than a star-struck kid: “As far back as Ican remem- ber, I’ve always wanted to be a gangster,” he remarks in the voice-over. Gangsters always dressed nice, had more money than anyone else, and they never had to wait in line. Ina grisly two hours, 15 minutes running time, GoodFellas takes us along as Henry Hill rises through the ranks. He meets many heavies, but settles into a kind of partnership with the notorious Jimmy Conway (De Niro) and Tommy DeVito (Joe Pesci). Both have personalities that would make them the hit of any party. Both, ultimately, are revealed as psychopathic. Scorsese’s method is deceptive. Good- Fellas begins in an almost comic tone, utiliz- ing a fine sense of irony that almost makes light of a car full of gangsters having to pull over and finish off the bloodied individual in the trunk. But what begins as a romp turns serious as the corpses mount. Blood may be blood, but when it’s spilled over trivials such as a verbal insult, or when people who are supposedly long-time friends begin show- ROBERT DE NIRO, RAY LIOTTA IN GOODFELLAS ... violence is not glamourized. ing up on meat hooks, the laughs choke in our throats. Only those who enjoyed the slaughter in _amovie like Platoon could find their jollies in the violence of GoodFellas. Scorsese is uncompromising when it comes to depicting blood-letting, and his dialogue is invariably salty; but we are not allowed to become inured. As with his other films, Scorsese does not judge his characters; they rise or fall through their own words and actions. In North ‘America, that usually makes for effective cinema, at least with discerning audiences. If there is an objection.to be made, it is that GoodFellas never presents an alternative to the protagonists’ appalling standards (not only the violence: check the decor of their homes and the nightclubs they frequent). Confined to a faceless suburbia under an assumed name by the film’s end, Henry is remorseless about his past deeds. His sole regret is that he now has to line up like everyone else, and we almost sympathize; his life did seem, colourful compared with this bland, another-day-another-dollar exist- ence. . ~ GoodFellas makes the point through simple depiction that run-down neighbour- hoods create anti-social habits in people. But other people come out of those same areas with the will to work for social change. Since . this is Henry’s story, we never get to see them. The strength of this film is its expose quality. With all the harping these days about the alleged superiority of capitalism, Good- Fellas, and Mean Streets and Taxi Driver for that matter, remind us of its social cost. And we can’t forget the acting. De Niro, star of many Scorsese films, is back in fine form after several unchallenging roles in ho-hum Hollywood fare. Few actors can match De Niro for character depth; peering over his glasses as he directs a woman towards what we fear is her assassination, he can appear simultaneously a harmless, mid- dle-aged businessman and the ruthless killer behind the mask. —Dan Keeton IT’S A MATTER OF SURVIVAL. By Anita Gordon and David Suzuki. Stodart Publishing Company, 1990. Available at People’s Co-op Book- store, Vancouver. $29.95. In the past two centuries the industrial revolution has resulted in massive appli- cations of technology on a world scale. Concurrently, there has been an unprece- dented growth in population. In dealing with the problems arising from this growth, humankind could be destroyed by ecological disasters. So warn Anita Gordon and David Suzuki. In It’s a Matter of Survival, they maintain that if we are to save ourselves, we must reject the following ideas: nature is infinite; growth is progress; science and technology will solve our problems; all of nature is at our disposal; we can manage the planet. The book grew out of a major, five- hour, five-part radio series carried over CBC Radio in 1989. Gordon was the orig- inator, executive producer and co-writer with Suzuki of that highly rated series. Suzuki is a scientist, a popular broad- caster on radio and television and writer of a nationally syndicated newspaper column on science, technology and the environment. The environmental horrors described in this book are very real. The authors cite: ¢ The destruction of forty hectares of tropical rain forest every minute, resulting in the extinction of at least two thousand species annually. Suzuki's environmental warning sound, but ignores corporate guilt ¢ Acid rain that is sterilizing lakes and forests. ¢ The destruction of the ozone layer; carbon dioxide and methane loading that is causing global warming. ¢ The accumulation of massive amounts of toxic chemicals in air, water, soil and food. ¢ The annual loss of billions of tons of agricultural topsoil and the consequent steady decline in total food production since 1984, The explosive increase in human pop- ulation that is adding a quarter of a million people daily. Perhaps some readers will say, “But we have been speaking and writing about these problems for years.” True, but only up to a point. In this book the authors demonstrate their unique skills as pop- ularizers of some very complex problems. Also, they bring us the informed opinions of a wide circle of experts, again in pop- ular language. Gordon and Suzuki label the privately owned automobile as public enemy num- ber one. To them, it is incompatible with the well-being of the planet and human survival. In 1987, there were close to 12 million automobiles registered in Canada, demonstrating that the majority of Can- adians have accepted the automobile as a necessity. ‘The book offers the following alterna- tive: fuels with low carbon content, more buses, electric trains and bicycles. In dealing with the poverty of the un- derdeveloped countries, the authors main- tain that “any positive growth in the de- veloping countries will have to be counter- balanced by a reduction in the wealthier countries.” Thus instead of sustainable growth, and instead of diverting a good part of what is being spent on armaments today towards helping the under- developed countries, we are offered the no-growth alternative. In describing how they would achieve their objectives, Gordon and Suzuki sub- mit the following formula: through love, belonging, family, community and shar- ing a love of nature. We cannot quarrel with these values, but we can hardly agree that in themselves they are enough to save us from ecological disaster. For example, the fight to protect Howe Sound from the pollution caused by pulp mills brought the environmentalists into sharp conflict with the corporate structure that dominates the Canadian economy. There can be no serious struggle for a better environment in Canada unless we are prepared to curtail the power of that corporate minority. The book doesn’t come close to this question except for a mild quote from Ralph Nader, the consumer advocate. On the other hand, it gives the Soviet Union and Europe bad marks on environmental questions. In the opinion of this reviewer, that only goes to prove that we have a right to expect more and better from socialism. This is an informative book, both for the average reader and for the activist. —Jack Phillips 10 « Pacific Tribune, November 5, 1990