Ray Liotta is superb here as "Henry Hill", a man whom ever since he was young has been captivated by the mob. He starts off as a runner and before too long has ingratiated himself with the local fraternity lead by "Paulie" (Paul Sorvino) and is best mates with fellow hoods, the enigmatic and devious "Jimmy" (Robert De Niro) and the excellently vile "Tommy" (Joe Pesci). They put together an audacious robbery at JFK and are soon the talk of the town, but the latter in the trio is a bit of a live-wire and when he goes just a bit too far one night, the three of them find that their really quite idyllic lives of extortion and larceny start to go awry - and it's their own who are on their tracks. Scorsese takes him time with this story: the development of the characters - their personalities, trust, inter-reliance, sometimes divided, fractured, loyalties and ruthlessness and are built up in a thoroughly convincing fashion. We can, ourselves, see the obvious attractions for the young "Henry" of a life so very far removed from his working class Irish-Italian background - the wine, the women, the thrills; it's tantalising! If anything let's it down it's the last half hour; it's just a little too predictable and having spent so long building up the characters, we seem to be in just a bit too much of a rush; but that is a nit-pick. It's not the "Godfather" but it is not far short.