Of course. We have all heard the saying about truth being stranger than fiction. I like all of those movies and remember all of the hype and the law forbidding profiting from writing/selling movie rights about crimes after Goodfellas became such a hit. A Bronx Tale was good too but maybe not so much a mob movie per se.
I knew a girl, well a woman (she had a son almost my age), in college from the area that had grown up and knew some of the Bonnano family. Some interesting descriptions of the house! On May 26, 2013 10:15 AM, "Raymond Feist/New ATT" <[email protected]> wrote: > > On May 26, 2013, at 12:14 AM, Nick Andrews <[email protected]> wrote: > > I have always enjoyed reading about it. Not quite the romanticized > Hollywood world many seem to think of it, but I still like the movie Good > fellas. > > > > Except Goodfella's isn't "Hollywood." It's a biography of the character > played by Ray Liota, Henry Hill, who is a real person. > > Two other exceptional films on the mob are Casino, another biography of a > real person, and L.A. Confidential, which is fact based fiction. > > Books like Murder Machine paint quite a different light on the subject. > The results of Prohibition had such a profound effect on the development of > this nation in the first half of the twentieth century. Makes me wonder > what might have been if those guys had simply reported the income and paid > the taxes... But I imagine you're right and eventually the massive > corruption in the government officials would have toppled it anyway. Not > unlike certain recent events. > > They couldn't, given while it would have made the iRS happy on one hand, > getting their taxes, it would have alerted them on the other hand. Most > people don't recall that at that time the IRS had enforcement > responsibility over Prohibition, not the F.B.I which was seen as strictly > an information gathering agency until 1932 when it got more enforcement > authority. > > The movie Gomorrah was interesting and not quite what I expected. What > books about the Mafia did you find to be the most interesting? > > > Start with Godfather. While highly fictionalized, it represents to a > large degree the evolution of the culture from the old "Mustache Pete's" > Manzaria and Maranzano, to the five families. Bill Bonnano's four books > on growing up as the son of a Don are fascinating. The one I mentioned > above, Wiseguy by Nick Paleggi (which became Goodfella's because of a title > issue which meant they couldn't call it Wiseguy), For a more modern take, > check out Organized crime by Howard Abadinsky. > > Best, R,.E.F. > >
