"When they found Carbone in the meat truck, he was frozen so stiff it took them two days to thaw him out for the autopsy."
As a Moments subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.
- Tommy DeVito is Nightmare Fuel incarnate.
- Even worse: Martin Scorsese had to tone down some things Tommy did in real life...
- If that wasn't enough, Henry Hill himself said that the only thing different about Tommy in the film was his physical appearance (in real life, Tommy DeSimone, the real mobster Tommy was based on, was tall, well-built and had a moustache); everything else was spot-on. The fact that Tommy's craziness wasn't exaggerated at all is blood-curdling.
- Tommy's execution is pretty horrifying, especially as he realizes what's about to happen a fraction of a second before the bullet goes through his head. Also, they specifically shot him in the head, just so his mother couldn't give him an open-casket funeral. Tommy might have deserved what he got, but his mother didn't do anything wrong.
- Even worse: Martin Scorsese had to tone down some things Tommy did in real life...
- The scene where Jimmy starts thinking about whacking Morrie and all the other accomplices in the Lufthansa heist. He just sits there smoking but then the music goes up and you know he's up to no good.
- Robert De Niro's eyes in that scene. They just say, with such incredible subtlety, "Time to go on a killing spree."
- The way Henry gets beaten by his father with a belt as a teenager is brutally realistic. It's early on in the film, and highly disturbing.
- After everything, after all the horrible things he's been a part of, all Hill really cares about is the loss of his gangster status. He doesn't care that he's been partially responsible for the murder and ruining the lives of countless innocent people, all he ever gave a fuck about was himself. At least Tommy's sociopathy was out on the surface.
- This was intentional. Martin Scorsese got complaints at the previews and he said that the audience should be angry, that people should question the mentality and values of the culture that makes being a "schnook" such a bad thing.
- One of the scariest things about the movie is how casually the mobsters treat murdering their own. One of the best examples is how, rather than simply pay everyone for their roles in the Lufthansa heist, Jimmy would rather just murder all of the people he hangs out with and considers friends and even Henry notes he doesn't particularly care as long as Jimmy doesn't kill him, too. Even later, it's shown that one of Tommy's murderers is Tuddy.
- One of the things that really drives home the casual brutality of mobster mentality is in the famous "How am I funny?" scene. After Henry realizes Tommy is just messing with him, and everyone laughs it off, the bar owner comes up to talk to Tommy about an outstanding bill he has. Tommy gets pissed and smashes a bottle over the poor guy's head, and all the other mobsters don't just act like assaulting someone for basically no reason is no big deal, it's funny to them, even though just moments ago they were honestly afraid Tommy was going to possibly murder Henry for no reason other than accidentally offending him. Also, who's to say Tommy wasn't serious, and just changed his mind when Henry called him out?
- Even scarier - this was based on something that really happened to Joe Pesci in real life.
- The Peek-a-Boo Corpse reveals of the Lufthansa heist perps' bodies (especially Frankie Carbone in the meat locker), all set to the instrumental break in Eric Clapton's "Layla".Henry Hill: I knew Jimmy. He had the cash. It was his. He kicked some money upstairs to Paulie, but that was it. It made him sick to turn money over to the guys who stole it. He'd rather whack them. What did I care? I wasn't asking for anything. And Jimmy was making nice money through my Pittsburgh connections. Still, months after the robbery they were finding bodies all over. When they found Carbone in the meat truck, he was frozen so stiff that it took two days to thaw him out for the autopsy.
- Two scenes with Jimmy in particular are meant to chill the audience by showing what a casual monster Jimmy really is. The first scene is when Jimmy asks Henry, "Think Morrie tells his wife everything?" and Henry narrates that Jimmy by just asking the question, has revealed beyond a shadow of a doubt that he's going to kill Morrie. The second scene is towards the very end of the film after Henry and Karen have been busted, and it's very subtle because it doesn't involve any revealing narration: Jimmy asks Karen what kinds of questions the police have been asking Henry. Just by the nature of the question, the tone of his voice, and the look on his face, it's meant to clue in the audience that Jimmy is thinking the exact same thoughts about Henry at that moment, as when he decided to kill Morrie.
- During the party where Morrie is set to be whacked, Henry is internally trying to think about how to convince Jimmy not to kill Morrie. After the whole gang has such a good time with Morrie, Jimmy tells Henry their plan to kill him is cancelled, relieving Henry. Later that night, Tommy fatally stabs him in the back of the neck with an ice pick because he wouldn't shut up. To further show how much of a monster Jimmy is, Carbone is involved in the murder and is later killed himself. It legitimately doesn’t matter how good you are to Jimmy Conway or how loyal you are to the crew. The second Jimmy thinks you are in the way of him making more money, you will die.
- A small one during the iconic introduction scene. As Henry quickly lists off the big names that he was aware of, he blows by a man named Pete the Killer. Just imagine for a moment how many people you need to whack for your freaking mob epithet to be "The Killer". Even his one line is implying that he just got done with a job, as if that's all he does.
- Jimmy and Paulie getting arrested. The last time the former got arrested he basically laughed it off, this time he was legitimately pissed knowing how and why he got arrested. Meanwhile, when Paulie gets arrested you can see him slowly walking with the cops with a very passive look on his face. You could tell in that moment Paulie was suppressing his rage. It's a good thing they never got free otherwise Henry would've been wiped clean from the planet earth!
