Wen 丨 Gray Wolf
Whether you like "The Irishman" or not, it's a great achievement to make the long-retired Joe Pesci comeback with this film alone.
The Irishman (2019)
The return was a twist and turn, with Joe Pesci having already made up his mind, and if it weren't for Martin Scorsese's no less than fifty gracious invitations and the soft and hard bubbles of his friend Robert De Niro, it would be unknown whether the Triangular cooperation would have been achieved.
Perhaps it was Robert De Niro's words that struck him: "We have to do this together, and who knows if there will be other opportunities in the future."
One Last Hit, this could be the final blow of the gold medal actors in the gangster epic film of their lifetime.
This is also scorsese's "conscience", in the face of Marvel and other new forces sweeping the world, he hopes to single-handedly bring gangster films back to the peak of 1970-1990, for which he needs this group of old actors, because they are the "world standard" and "highest standard" of gangster epic films.
In the end, "The Irishman" did not disappoint the general audience, its specifications, texture, feelings and group performances are close to the peak level of gangster movies since 1970, and even some viewers do not hesitate to choose it into the historical top5 of this genre, juxtaposed with "Godfather 1-2", "Good Guys" and "Once Upon a Time in America".
The most frequent prop in "The Irishman" is the car, and the temperament of the whole film is also like a noble Cadillac.
If the whole film is compared to a car, then Robert De Niro is the solid chassis of the car, and Al Pacino is the roaring engine. As for Joe Percy, it is the most critical braking system.
Joe Percy's Russell Buffalino is an old and calm godfather. He and Mick Hoffa, the president of the truckers' union played by Al Pacino, constitute exactly the yin and yang sides of the American Mafia — the latter is face, the former is Lizi, and the killer Frank, played by Robert De Niro, travels back and forth between the two, at the mercy of the two.
Among the three people, Robert's delicate grasp and Pacino's explosion performance are the same as ever, except for Joe Pescie's drama path, he has changed from a wild thug who flew wild in "Good Guys" and "Casino Storm" to a calm and terrifying gangster who is not angry.
He plays Russell with both a cold side, who can quietly instruct his friends to kill his best friends, and a soft side, protecting his subordinate Frank at all times. His complexity is hidden under his sunglasses, and we can only perceive what he does from the slight smile that rises from the corner of his mouth.
In other words, Joe Percy, even the best of the three, can hold on to Al Pacino and can hold down Robert De Niro.
He won the New York Film Critics Association Best Supporting Actor, known as the Oscar Bell, for this film, and was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. This time, al Pacino was also shortlisted for the Oscar, but to be fair, Joe Pescie had a much greater chance of winning the award than Pacino.
Even if it is impossible to change the fate of supporting roles, it is necessary to do the supporting roles to the extreme, and in the era when the emperor is full of superstars and the four major movie emperors dominate, Joe Pesci always has his own place.
Joe Pesci, along with Pacino, De Niro, and Scorsese, is of Italian descent and grew up in Brooklyn, New York, learning to sing and perform on stage from an early age, not belonging to the typical method school and closer to the wild way.
When he was cast in 1975, he was 5 feet 4 inches (about 1 meter 63), 7 centimeters shorter than the short film emperor Al Pacino. If Pacino's 1.70 meters is the height floor set by hollywood protagonists, then Joe Percy is doomed from the start.
What is visible to the naked eye is that this awkward height can neither make him a circus-style special actor like his Italian compatriot Danny DeVito (1 meter 52 tall), nor can he flirt with the heroine, at most it is just the type of passerby.
But he was also extremely fortunate to meet Martin Scorsese in 1980, which became an important piece of the gangster epic of the time.
Of course, the limited Joe Pesci can only give people a match, but standing next to the emperor superstar Robert De Niro is different. In Raging Bull, Joe Pesci plays De Niro's younger brother, who, in addition to helping him with all sorts of social distractions, also gives him a sandbag.
The Angry Bull (1980)
De Niro practices his tough guy approach very fully in the film, like a rampage bull, and Joe Pesci even broke a rib by him during rehearsal. However, in the opponent scene, Joe Pesci has never been left behind, and although his character is a typical loyal, talkative and slightly dull image, it is like a powerful rein that can be braked at key moments.
In addition, Joe Percy also shows his potential explosiveness in a scene where the bad guy hooks up with his sister-in-law and beats him up. Joe Percy's thunderbolt nature was exposed, which went on to flourish in Good Guys and Casino Fun.
The brilliant performance of "Angry Bull" gave Joe Percy his first Oscar nomination, while "Good Guys" really made him shine and win. In Good Guys, De Niro's role is not heavy, and in the end, Joe Pesci successfully stole the limelight of Ray Lyotard and almost became the protagonist.
The Good Guys (1990)
Especially in an impromptu performance at the bar, his half-joking, half-threatening talk show had Ray Lyotard, the opposite, repeatedly ride a roller coaster between ecstasy and fear. "How my funny, what's my fuck funny", in which he utters nearly 300 Fuck sentences, becoming a veritable "King of Fuck". This kind of arrogance that does not leave the mouth, and the viciousness of pulling out a knife and killing people and shooting at every turn, jumping out of his short body, is particularly shocking.
Two clashes with the young bartender were particularly typical, first when he accidentally hit the bartender's foot at the dinner table and then continued eating without apologetic scolding and grinning; the second time the bartender wrapped his feet in gauze to serve, and he insulted him and shot him to death after the other party was angry.
This is enough to be called the most brutal, vicious, impulsive, and grumpy personality, and Joe Pesci has almost put himself at some point in the role of others, and he can still do it.
From "Good Guys" to "Casino Storm", he plays such brutal and vicious gang members, and in the end, he inevitably leads to the fate of loss of control and destruction. At the end of these two films, he did not have a good ending, once he was flowered by his head, once he was knocked unconscious and buried alive, which is the typical logic that many acts of injustice will kill themselves. But the vicious gangsters portrayed by Joe Percy have left a wonderful mark on the history of gangster films.
Casino Fun (1995)
Joe Pesci has worked with Martin Scorsese four times and Robert De Niro seven times. Of the three more, two were De Niro's directorial work The Bronx and The Secret Service; the other was Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in America, in which he did not compete for the role of Max (later given to James Woods), and only starred in the role of Frankie, who was not a heavy role, but also a goose.
Once Upon a Time in America (1984)
In these gangster films, in addition to the explosive side, his words and extremely characteristic Donald Duck voice are also favored by the audience. If he were thirty years younger, he would have become Quentin Tarantino's favorite kind of actor.
In his own time, however, this trait also had a different use – as a comedian, he presented completely different performances in works such as "The Devil Is Home", "Deadly Weapons" and "My Cousin Winnie" (1992).
My Cousin Winnie (1992)
In fact, in the comedy, Joe Percy is a full-fledged meme, quite cartoonish. In the "Little Devil Is Home" series, he still plays the image of the stupid thief in the traditional family drama, but relying on micro-expressions, exquisite prop settings (gold teeth) and clumsy body language, he is very successful in this almost off-line role. Or maybe only in the comedy genre can he have the opportunity to become a protagonist.
"The Little Devil Is Home"
Unfortunately, joe percy's performances in several films, "Dear Mr. Wonderful" (1982), "The Landlord from Hell" (1991), "Star Road Turns" (1994), "Fun Fishing Threesome" (1997) and "Eight Heads in a Cloth Bag" (1997), were all moderately evaluated.
Star Road Turn (1994)
The only thing that stands out is the frequently ugly but crooked rookie lawyer in "My Cousin Winnie", but unfortunately he is stolen by the film's heroine, Marissa Tomei, who won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress that year, and Joe Pescie for nothing.
It turns out that Joe Percy is more radiant in the supporting role, and he is essentially an "auxiliary actor" who exists to coordinate the protagonist's actions and is a key link in helping them accelerate, slow down, lubricate, or brake. That's why Joe Percy is so indispensable in The Irishman.
Of course, Joe Percy's brilliance will not be covered by those brilliant superstars, and his acting elasticity and strong supporting ability make him one of the most professional supporting roles in Hollywood. After all, without a peerless tiger like Joe Percy, how can he become a "king's man" like De Niro?