What does this scene tell you about the main character?
- He has money and influence and is widely known.
- He is confident of his power and not afraid to show it.
- Others want his attention and/or good favour.
How does it do this? List the ‘clues’.
- He has an expensive car.
- He has money and is willing to pay for extra services.
- He has access to things that most people would have to wait for (doorman lets him in via a side entrance, ahead of the queue waiting outside a club).
- He is proud of all this and wants the woman he is with to know it.
- He is a regular at this club and knows the staff by name.
- He is comfortable enough to take a walk uninvited and unescorted through the kitchen. No one objects.
- He expects to get a table directly in front of the Copacabana’s stage and does so, ahead of others who are waiting.
- The surrounding customers are anxious to greet him.
- A table full of men send a complimentary bottle of wine to his table and raise their glasses to him in salute.
- He says he works in construction, but his hands do not feel like those of a labourer.
- He says he is a union delegate.
Reference
The Long Take: Goodfellas (s.d.) At: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJEEVtqXdK8 (Accessed 25/01/2020).
Context and Narrative 