10 Greatest Ray Liotta Movies - Ranked

This spectacular, underrated crime thriller by Andrew Dominick sees a few gangster icons send up their personas in an acerbic examination of criminal culture. Most notable is James Gandolfini as a once-prominent hitman, now wheezing, worn out, and inept.

Also fantastic is Ray Liotta, whose character is the catalyst for the story. He plays Markie Trattman, a mob-adjacent schmuck whose card game is held up by two low level crooks. The problem is that Markie has faked a robbery before so as to make off with the cash, and the assumption is he’s tried to pull the same con twice.

He hasn’t, but that’s besides the point. Markie has caused the mob to lose face as well as cash, and as such, he’s got to go. Liotta is a dead man walking for all his screen time here. He knows it, but Markie has no choice but to keep smiling, hustling, and pretending everything’s alright until it very much isn’t.

The hunched, sad sack Liotta is a mile away from his Goodfellas prime here, and utilises his status perfectly. As far back as Markie can remember, he probably wanted to be a gangster - this is where it’s got him.