For decades, audiences around the world have been drawn to the seductive, ultraviolent world of organized crime. Mob stories have become a genre filmmakers return to over and over again, despite the well-worn narrative arcs, stock characters and fundamental repulsiveness of what gangsters do for a living. Creating a list of the best mob movies is therefore not for the faint of heart and is sure to inspire many exclamations of “Get outta here!”
‘On the Waterfront’ (1954)
On the Waterfront (1954) Trailer #1 | Movieclips Classic Trailers - YouTube
When he was young, Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando) took a dive in a prizefight at the behest of mob boss Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb). “I coulda been somebody” had he not thrown the match on purpose, he laments to his brother Charley (Rod Steiger) in one of cinema’s most-quoted scenes. Years later, as a longshoreman in a union controlled by Friendly’s syndicate, Malloy is asked to testify against his bosses in an investigation. Director Elia Kazan’s film showcases the agonizing moral quandaries that organized criminals often create for ordinary people. It “fused elements of neorealism with the German-influenced expressionism of popular noirs to achieve an unusual tone of gritty fantasia,” said Chuck Bowen at Slant Magazine.
Based on Mario Puzo’s 1969 novel, director Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Godfather” is the saga of the Corleones, a New York City crime family headed by Vito (Marlon Brando). When violence breaks out with a rival family and Vito is wounded, his eldest, Sonny (James Caan), steps into the role, and his younger son Michael (Al Pacino) is slowly drawn into the family business. While it sometimes has the “quality of a romantic fable whose principal characters are in some ways charmed,” it also offers “as dark and ominous a reflection of certain aspects of American life as has ever been presented in a movie designed as sheer entertainment,” said Vincent Canby at The New York Times.
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Director Martin Scorsese’s brisk, often hilarious mafia movie is based on Nicholas Pileggi’s 1985 book, “Wiseguy: Life in a Mafia Family,” about Henry Hill, who joins a New York crime syndicate as an 11-year-old and then rises up the ranks. Playing Hill as an adult is the late Ray Liotta in a triumphant, unnerving performance alongside fellow mobsters Tommy DeVito (Joe Pesci) and James Conway (Robert De Niro), who are working for the local capo Paulie Cicero (Paul Sorvino). Hill and his wife, Karen (Lorraine Bracco), ascend to the heights of the underworld and then unravel with impeccable flair. “Goodfellas” is a “triumphant piece of filmmaking — journalism presented with the brio of drama,” said Pauline Kael at The New Yorker.
‘Gomorrah’ (2008)
A “film about the day laborers of crime,” this award-winning Italian drama “looks grimy and sullen, and has no heroes, only victims,” said Roger Ebert. While many classic mafia movies like “Goodfellas” give their characters the illusion of glamour, wealth and power before pulling the rug out in the final act, “Gomorrah” is proudly, almost relentlessly bleak throughout. The film explores the seedy criminal underworld of the real-world Camorra crime syndicate through the eyes of five people touched by its violence, including Totò(Salvatore Abbruzzese), a 13-year-old boy who joins the organization after recovering a bag of drugs. The movie’s success led to a well-regarded TV series of the same name.
‘A Prophet’ (2009)
When 19 year-old Malik El Djebena, an illiterate Algerian petty criminal, is sent to prison for assaulting police officers, he is inducted into the Corsican mafia in a bleak French prison by carrying out a hit for the group’s boss, César Luciani (Niels Arestrup). Most of director Jacques Audiard’s celebrated movie is set in the prison and follows Malik as he gradually earns Luciani’s trust and earns a bigger role, especially during daylong furloughs from the prison. Malik is also haunted by the specter of Reyeb (Hichem Yacoubi), the inmate he offed to gain protection in the first place. The film is an “acknowledgment of social conditions that create smarter, better criminals, as opposed to rehabilitating them,” said Brian Eggert at Deep Focus Review.
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David Faris is a professor of political science at Roosevelt University and the author of "It's Time to Fight Dirty: How Democrats Can Build a Lasting Majority in American Politics." He's a frequent contributor to Newsweek and Slate, and his work has appeared in The Washington Post, The New Republic and The Nation, among others.
