When you think about mafia movies, it’s likely the first one that comes to mind is Francis Ford Coppola’s 1972 classic, The Godfather, and the two ensuing films that make up one of the most famous and talked-about trilogies of all time. The first two films are based on Mario Puzo’s 1969 novel, and Puzo worked with Coppola on the third installment as well.
While one of the genre’s greatest works is based on fiction, a history of crime and violence led by powerful leaders is inspiring enough for many filmmakers, who can draw their stories from headlines and memoirs. Knowing a film is based on a true story, even loosely, adds an extra edge of grit and realism. Here are 22 mafia movies that only had to open a newspaper to find their source material.
‘Goodfellas’ (1990)
Once you get past The Godfather, another main contender for the most famous mafia movie ever made is Martin Scorsese’s 1990 film Goodfellas. It was based on Nicholas Pileggi’s 1985 book Wiseguy: Life in a Mafia Family, a biography of turncoat Henry Hill, a one-time gangster with the Lucchese crime family. He was with the Lucchese family for nearly thirty years, enjoying everything that being part of a notorious mafia family had to offer, until a drug bust turned him into an FBI informant and things truly went off the rails.
He was played to perfection by the late Ray Liotta, and we watch Hill’s involvement with the mafia from his youth in the fifties, his rise through the ranks, and his inevitable downfall. The cast didn’t have a chance to meet Hill until after the film was made, but Hill told Liotta that he loved it. Critics did too, as the movie remains one of Scorsese’s highest-rated films on Rotten Tomatoes.
‘The Untouchables’ (1987)
If you’re looking for a historically accurate recounting of Eliot Ness and his quest to take down Al Capone in the days of Prohibition, you might want to look elsewhere, but if you’re looking for historically inspired entertainment with Kevin Costner, Sean Connery, and Robert De Niro, you’ve come to the right place.
Brian De Palma’s 1987 movie was written by playwright David Mamet, and loosely based on the real Eliot Ness’ 1957 memoir (which itself was questioned for historical accuracy). Much of the action in the film is fictional, but with high-drama scenes like Sean Connery’s operatic death (he won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for the role) and the Battleship Potemkin Odessa Steps sequence at the train station, it’s hard to complain.
‘Gomorrah’ (2008)
Mateo Garrone’s 2008 film was based on Roberto Saviano’s explosive 2006 investigative journalism book, for which he has lived in hiding and under police protection ever since. The book delved into the secrets of the Camorra, the mafia-like group that has operated predominantly in Naples since the 17th century. At this point, the Camorra had its hands in a far-reaching number of pots: from protection rackets and knock-off designer clothing to a stranglehold on garbage collection, which caused a trash crisis.
The film focused on several disparate characters, showing how organized crime affects their lives, whether they’re criminals. A television show followed the film’s success, and both casts included non-professional actors whose real-life Camorra involvement saw them arrested for various crimes, including at least one murder rap.
‘Donnie Brasco’ (1997)
Al Pacino and Johnny Depp chewed some serious scenery in Mike Newell’s 1997 mafia film, inspired by Joseph D. Pistone’s 1988 memoir, Donnie Brasco: My Undercover Life in the Mafia. Depp played Pistone/Brasco, an undercover FBI agent posing as a jewel thief under the tutelage of Lefty Ruggiero (Pacino), an enforcer for the Bonanno family.
Over the course of six years, Pistone’s undercover work created complications for his family and conflicted him about Ruggiero, but he was pulled in by the FBI before he became a made man in the Bonannos. To this day, Pistone and his family live at an undisclosed location, while continuing to use his expertise in organized crime to aid international law enforcement and testifying in court cases. The movie remains one of the best about an undercover agent to date.
‘Black Mass’ (2015)
2015’s Black Mass jumped into the story of Whitey Bulger practically as it was still unfolding. Johnny Depp starred as Bulger, a notorious Boston mobster who led the Winter Hill Gang. The film follows Bulger’s ruthless reign in South Boston starting in 1975, and was filmed only two years after Bulger’s arrest, after nearly 20 years as a fugitive.
The movie was largely based on the 2001 book by Dick Lehr and Gerard O’Neill, Black Mass: Whitey Bulger, the FBI, and a Devil’s Deal, so it doesn’t get the chance to go into Bulger’s fugitive years, not to mention his violent death in prison in 2018. Bulger reportedly refused to watch the film, even with a blockbuster cast that included Kevin Bacon, Joel Edgerton, Benedict Cumberbatch, and Jesse Plemons.
‘The French Connection’ (1971)
Two years before he directed The Exorcist, WIlliam Friedkin took on the story of real NYPD detectives Eddy Egan and Sonny Grosso, using Robin Moore’s 1969 book to transform their story into that of Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle (Gene Hackman) and Buddy “Cloudy” Russo (Roy Scheider), hot on the trail of a French heroin smuggler through the streets of New York.
Not only was The French Connection praised for sticking to the true story, but it also features one of the best car chases in screen history, with Popeye careening through the streets of Bensonhurst, trying to catch up with an elevated train. The subsequent sequel, The French Connection II, cut ties with the actual story.
‘The General’ (1998)
The true story of Irish crime lord Martin Cahill (Brendan Gleeson in one of his best performances) was written by Irish journalist Paul Williams, and John Boorman used it as the basis for his 1998 film. Cahill pulled a number of notorious heists before falling afoul of the police and the Irish Republican Army, eventually being assassinated in 1994 by still unknown assailants.
Cahill’s unorthodox family life also heightened his intrigue: he had five children with his wife, Frances, but the word was that he had a further four with Frances’ sister, Tina, who lived with them. The meta true-life twist is that Cahill actually robbed Boorman once, stealing the gold record he’d won for the soundtrack of Deliverance.
‘Bugsy’ (1991)
In Bugsy, Warren Beatty was at his suave, lady-killing best as notorious gangster Bugsy Siegel, who, along with associates Meyer Lansky (Ben Kingsley) and Charlie “Lucky” Luciano (Bill Graham). Together, they left New York behind to try and break into the California and Las Vegas gambling markets, and the film also details his affair with showgirl Virginia Hill, who was played by Annette Bening, whom Beatty married the next year.
Harvey Keitel makes an appearance as Mickey Cohen, an up-and-coming gangster who impresses Bugsy with a robbery, and Elliott Gould is Harry Greenberg, an old friend of Bugsy’s who has fallen on hard times, and Bugsy has no choice but to take him out. Beatty and screenwriter James Toback had been working on a screenplay for years, and ended up landing Barry Levinson to direct the 1991 film, which ended with Bugsy’s still-unsolved murder.
‘On the Waterfront’ (1954)
While not wholly based on specific true-life characters, Elia Kazan’s 1954 drama starring Marlon Brando was inspired by a series of articles in The New York Sun about longshoremen, for which journalist Malcolm Johnson won a Pulitzer Prize. The article series focused on union corruption and violence on the docks of Hoboken, New Jersey, and was titled “Crime on the Waterfront.”
Brando played Terry Malloy, a dockworker and former boxer who unwittingly lures a friend to his death at the behest of a union boss, and in the ensuing fallout falls for the friend’s sister, Edie (Eva Marie Saint in her debut role). Karl Malden (who helped get Brando into the career-defining role) co-stars as a local priest trying to get the dockworkers to resist corruption.
‘The Sicilian Girl’ (2007)
Rita Atria grew up in Sicily, and by the age of 17, having already lost her mafia-connected father and brother, she was inspired to testify against the mafia to the police. She ended up being kicked out by her mother, losing family and friends, and eventually committing suicide after the prosecuting judge to whom she had grown close was killed by a car bomb.
Marco Amenta first used her story as the basis for a 1997 documentary, and then for a 2007 film inspired by it, starring Veronica D’Agostino as a character based on Rita. The real-life Rita’s testimony (along with that of her widowed sister-in-law) led to several mafia arrests, making this a tragic yet essential courtroom drama and mafia movie.
This story originally appeared on Movieweb
