Rating of
2.5/4
Concrete Shoes!
MovieAddict - wrote on 02/19/12
Billy Bathgate (Loren Dean) is a punk street kid from the Bronx, who is ambitious and wants to make money. The easiest way is to become a gangster, and he is thrilled to be noticed by wealthy Dutch Schultz (Dustin Hoffman) who is the head of the Jewish Mafia but Dutch is losing his grip as the FBI prosecutes him for tax evasion and mobsters Moe Weinberg and Lucky Luciano turn against him, believing that he's losing his touch and needs to be gotten rid of.
Dustin Hoffman gives a fine performance of a cunning, ruthless, and violent gangster whose way of dealing with a problem is to eliminate it as directly as possible. He's unpredictable; he may pat your face one minute and put a bullet through your open mouth the next. Steven Hill as Otto Berman, Schultz' long time operations manager and money man, gives an outstanding performance. Although he is getting a little old and tired, he remains loyal to Schultz. Make no mistake; he's just as much a crook as Schultz. He develops a liking for Billy that saves Billy's life. Others worth mentioning are Stanley Tucci as Lucky Luciano, who is fascinating and calculating as a snake; Steve Buscemi plays one of Schultz' hoods who does what he's told. Dutch's girl friend is played by the ever gorgeous Nicole Kidman who has a sham marriage to a gay but powerful New Yorker Harvey, Xander Berkeley. She gets her kicks by dating gangsters but tells Billy in relation to her being with Dutch "No, I'm not his gal. He's my gangster." She is mesmerizing to watch and the male audience will certainly remember it for the full frontal nudity shots of Kidman . Timothy Jerome plays Dixie Davis, Schultz' slimy, dishonest and betraying lawyer, Bruce Willis is the luckless Bo Weinberg, Schultz's second-in-command, who makes the mistake of betraying Dutch and pays for that with his own life.
