The Offenders: Casino, Blow, American Hustle, The Iceman. Every since a director was young they wanted to be Scorcese. One of the biggest injustices in Oscar history is Goodfellas losing out on Best Picture to Dances With Wolves. While Kevin Costner's film has the epic scale (and length) of classic Hollywood, Martin Scorcese's gangster picture (coming in half an hour lighter) is not only impeccably made, but also reshaped a whole genre. Any classical gangster film since owes a debt in some small part to Goodfellas. And some owe a lot more than that. It's easy to distill the seeming formula that made the tale of Henry Hill so successful - decade spanning story charting the rise and fall of our hero, constant-yet-necessary voiceover, popular music on the soundtrack - and make another similar film, but that's missing that it was a method specific to the real-life story of a gangster. That didn't stop directors from all walks taking it as a shortcut to greatness, with Blow and American Hustle prime examples of films that relied heavily on Goodfellas without the intrigue (what's the life of a gangster on the street like) to make it interesting. Even Scorcese wasn't beyond aping the formula. Casino, released four years later and from a script again by Nicholas Pileggi, shared the structure and style of its older sibling, although it stands out as one of the better imitators, using the style to tell its own story (the fall of gangster-ran Vegas).
