Much craft on display in this gangster film that acquires some heft - even beyond the leg-up that a 3 hour plus running time always offers - despite what initially presents as a lack of psychological backstory or insight into the inner life of De Niro's Frank Sheeran but gradually comes to appear more a depiction of a person whose interiority is in fact completely bound up with his external life and actions. Indeed, the narrative - moving back and forth through time - stages a series of decisions that Frank makes, revealing him through his choices, none more so than when things come to a head between his two primaries in Al Pacino's Jimmy Hoffa and Joe Pesci's mob boss Russell Bufalino.
