The Conversation (0)
Celebrities
Frank Adonis stars in Goodfellas 'funny guy' scene
content.jwplatform.com
Blink and you’ll miss it…
A mistake in the movie GoodFellas has bothered eagle-eyed fans for decades; a prop license plate falls off a car as the camera pulls back.
The scene is question is when Karen Hill, the wife of the protagonist Henry, visits Jimmy for help but flees when she suspects she’s about to be murdered.
The scene was filmed in Brooklyn’s Gowanus neighborhood, at the cross-section of Smith Street and 9th Street.
For years people have been noticing the error, and sharing it online.
Before and after
In a post on Reddit two years ago, a fan said: “This is my favorite movie and I've watched it hundreds or times and never noticed that.”
But, in a new 4k remaster of the movie, due for release in September, it appears to have been fixed.
Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter
One fan asked: “Wonder why’d they go back and fix that after all these years? I’ve always liked finding little mistakes in movies!”
But in the same scene, another tweak has been spotted - and it’s infuriated some GoodFellas purists.
The street signs in the original are have white text on a green background, but in the updated version the signs show blue text on a white background.
Now, let’s get nerdy; we're not old enough to remember this, but it seems each NYC borough had its own color scheme for signage until the 1970s.
They were blue on white for Queens; white on blue for the Bronx; green on yellow for Staten Island and Manhattan; and white on green for Brooklyn.
But given the scene took place in Brooklyn, the signs appear to be incorrect. Even if the scene took place in Queens, it apparently took place in 1980, when the signs would have already changed.
The issue was quickly spotted by GoodFellas sleuths:
One fan used it to make a rallying call to buy physical media - an issue that's been in the news after Roald Dahl children's books were rewritten to remove language that is deemed offensive.
Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.
Top 100
