Mean Streets
Short description
Mean Streets is set in New York's Little Italy, where Charlie, a young Italian American, works for his uncle, a local mob figure, and hopes to run a restaurant of his own. Rising in that world requires respectability and the right connections, but Charlie's loyalty to his reckless friend Johnny Boy, who is drowning in debt and careless about the trouble he causes, works against everything he wants. Charlie is also involved with Teresa, Johnny Boy's cousin, which complicates his position further as the pressures of the neighbourhood build toward the feast of San Gennaro.
Martin Scorsese directed and co-wrote the screenplay with Mardik Martin. The film is the fourth of the thirty-eight features he has directed, following Boxcar Bertha and preceding Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore. Harvey Keitel plays Charlie and Robert De Niro plays Johnny Boy, with David Proval, Amy Robinson, Richard Romanus and Cesare Danova among the twenty-seven credited cast members. Jonathan T. Taplin produced.
Released in October 1973, the crime drama grossed around 3 million dollars worldwide. Its reputation has grown considerably since: it holds 8.9 out of 10 from 78 reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, while audience ratings put it at 7.2 out of 10 on IMDb and 7 out of 10 on TMDB, a gap that suggests critics rate it more highly than general viewers do.
What's left behind the scenes
- In 1997, the film was included in the National Film Registry of the U.S. Library of Congress.
- Director John Cassavetes was also present at a preview screening of "Bertha, the Railway Worker." After the screening, he approached Scorsese, hugged him, and said, "You just wasted a year of your life creating a piece of crap." He advised Scorsese to film stories that he knew and understood. This inspired the young director to make his next film based on his own life experience. As a result, "Mean Streets" recreated events that Scorsese, growing up in Little Italy, regularly witnessed.
- According to Scorsese, the film's plot initially focused on the religious conflict of Charlie and its influence on his worldview. To this end, Scorsese and screenwriter Mardik Martin often drove around Little Italy while writing the script. They would find a spot next to the park and begin writing.
- Very little was filmed directly in the film's setting, New York. Most of the scenes were shot in Los Angeles. The unusual handheld camera techniques were largely a result of the film's meager budget, which was insufficient to set up a large number of tracks for filming. Thus, to realistically film Harvey Keitel's drunken scene, the camera was actually tied to the actor to convey the character's intoxicated state. For the same reason, the shooting schedule ultimately lasted only 25 days.
- As soon as funding was secured, Scorsese began casting. Robert De Niro met the director in 1972. He liked that he saw in "Who's That Knocking at My Door?": he was impressed by how realistically the film portrayed life in Little Italy. After one of the actors left the project, Scorsese chose Harvey Keitel, with whom he had worked previously, to play the lead role of Charlie.
- Scorsese compiled the film's soundtrack mainly from his own collection. As a result, the film features many pop and rock hits, including “Rubber Biscuit” by The Chips, “Be My Baby” by The Ronettes, a cover version of “Please Mr. Postman” by The Marvelettes, and songs “Jumpin' Jack Flash” and “Tell Me” by The Rolling Stones. Purchasing the rights to use the musical compositions in the film cost half its budget.
- The film was initially proposed as a sequel to "Who's That Knocking at My Door?" and was to be called "Witch Hunt Season."
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
