The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973)

It is essentially criminal (pun intended) that this neo-noir classic resides in the grey market, with unofficial copies being the best available way to see this film. It's 1973 and we are exposed to the criminal world in the greater Boston area during a relatively desolate autumn. Coyle, played in grand loser style by Mitchum, is running out of time while looking at an inevitable 3-5 year prison stint for bootlegging liquor (an outdated crime if there ever was one). He's an old hood, still wrapped up in doing favors and still in the know, but he's becoming a liability as he scrambles to avoid doing time. Peter Boyle is an associate of his, who runs a bar while also keeping his hands involved in the seamy side of business. Alex Rocco leads a band of bank robbers linked to Coyle who are making headlines as they take out banks left and right and Richard Jordan is a treasury agent who keeps intense links with underground figures who keep him in the know, including Boyle and Mitchum. Steven Keats plays a hotshot gun-dealer in one of his best-ever roles.

Yates makes this an intense film, slowly boiling over but never less than riveting. The locations cannot be overlooked; even if you weren't around in Boston at the time, the vibe is irrepressible. The dour, gray working class environs that the characters operate within still exist in Boston. The film has so many well-placed and subtle Boston area locations that one might easily consider the film not being as effective elsewhere. For Boston natives and residents, there is everything from a gun deal on Memorial Drive, to location shots at the Dorchester and Alewife bowling alleys, to repeated shots of Government Center, the Sharon train station, several old bars believed to be in Jamaica Plain or Downtown, Qunicy residences, South Station diner, and much more. For me, there is no greater classic Boston film from the period- the scene where the lead characters watch Bobby Orr and the Bruins play at the original Boston Garden cinches that.

Also especially notable is the attention to detail, both regionally and in plot. Although filmed in the early 70s, this film amazingly features NO black characters. This cannot be a coincidence- even though a renaissance of black actors was in effect at the time, the point is made that Boston was (is?) a hotbed of racial tension, especially in the pre-busing days. Some carefully placed comments elucidate this: KEATS- "I got some guy asking me for machine guns..." MITCHUM- "What color was he?" KEATS- "He's a nice guy.." Mentions of city districts and Coyle's expatriate Irish wife Sheila also add to the realism. Coyle is barely staying afloat in this world where no one is to be trusted. This classic noir motif works very well here, since it's quickly made obvious whose lives matter and whose don't in this almost airtight crime thriller.

The Friends Of Eddie Coyle is simply one of the best true-to-life films I've ever seen and a movie so well made it's hard to believe it's such a sleeper. Also note the excellent Dave Gruisin score which is also unreleased. One of the absolute best of the 1970s. Meanwhile in Boston today, bank robberies still occur regularly.

Now available from Amazon as a legal download, looks like no one else was eager to touch this classic for DVD release-- that's a real shame. Was also incidentally shown at Cambridge Massachusetts' Brattle Theater late 2007 in a spectacular print.

Fmovies: Anyone reading the Boston press in 2001 will be shocked to learn how real, how current this film really is. The connection between the FBI and organized crime is serious and is portrayed here with a sense of reality that cannot be matched. Peter Boyle is simply fantastic in his role as a Whitey Bulger character combining hit-man, bartender, informer, and a friend of Eddie Coyle. Why is this great film not on VHS or DVD???

Mitchum has never been better. This is an absolute gem of a film, very underrated and very under appreciated. Peter Boyle is also excellent and the direction superb. I think this film captures Boston and the lives of small time mobsters better than any other film.

Elmore Leonard called the novel upon which the movie is based the best crime novel ever written. The movie does it justice.

The Friends of Eddie Coyle fmovies. Anyone who does not think Robert Mitchum is a serious actor has never seen The Friends Of Eddie Coyle. All of Mitchum's considerable talents are working here including his fantastic ear for accents. You would think that Mitchum lived in Boston all his life.

Playing the title role in The Friends Of Eddie Coyle, Mitchum so submerges his own personality that you forget in fact you are watching Robert Mitchum and you really think you are seeing the downfall of a man named Eddie Coyle. How he was overlooked for an Oscar nomination here is a mystery.

The film is based on a novel by George V. Higgins who was both a prosecutor and defense attorney in his legal career and saw the system and all the system from both sides of the courtroom. The protagonist Eddie Coyle is a career criminal sliding into middle age and up for a sentencing in a transporting of stolen property charge in neighboring New Hampshire. He's a three time loser already and this would involve a much longer stretch in the joint. So he's looking to deal.

The Friends Of Eddie Coyle rather neatly disposes of the notion that there is honor among thieves. But thieves also don't like being informed on. When Mitchum rats out some old friends for a series of bank robberies where two people were killed, he's sealed his doom.

The obvious comparison to make with this film is the John Ford classic, The Informer. Although Coyle would probably scorn at being compared to a slow lug like Victor McLaglen's Gypo Nolan, in fact he's not a terribly bright man either. He's far down on the criminal food chain so that he is a very disposable man.

Another good performance from this film is that of Steven Keats as a gun runner who Mitchum does business with and decides to rat out when convenient. If he survives in another 25 years Keats will be in the middle aged position that Mitchum is in now with few options in life. Also take note of Peter Boyle as the bartender/criminal, Richard Jordan as a really smarmy cop and Helena Carroll who has a few, but some really well played scenes as Mitchum's long suffering wife.

The film was shot totally on location in the Boston area and I recognized quite a few locations from my travels there. No mention of the Red Sox, but towards the end of the film there are some nice shots of a Boston Bruins hockey game at the old Boston Gardens. Some very interesting comments there about star Bobby Orr and the bright future he has in the world of hockey from a man whose world is about to crumble.

The Friends Of Eddie Coyle is a classic from the Seventies one of the best films Robert Mitchum ever did and not to be missed, especially if one wants to see a different side of old rumple eyes.

I'm 42 and I've lived in Boston my whole life. I travel extensively and pay attention to the way people talk. Everywhere. For those of you that are not from here: People from Boston do not talk like the Kennedys. Really. No one except the Kennedys talk like that. OK, William Devane and Martin Sheen do sometimes, but they don't know any better.

Here's the point: Mitchum nails it. He doesn't over-do it (Cliff Claven) and doesn't under do it. Critics claim that Mitchum is good at accents but he really does nail this one - the toughest one: A native Boston accent. That is indicative of the whole movie. Mitchum nails everything. This is his most believable performance. Listen to him in this movie and you could really imagine him as a resident of Quincy. It fits. The bleak, cold hopelessness of the title character's life is played out to its inevitable conclusion. A real classic "not-trying-to-be-film-noir" example of classic film noir.

Signed, The Director's Son (Just Kidding - this is awesome! Watch it!)

What a great movie! One of the most realistic stories of the small-time criminal. Robert Mitchuim gives an outstanding performance as Eddie Coyle, a small-time Irish gangster who works both sides of the fence. Richard Jordan in a fine supporting role as a hard-nosed detective out to burst a gang of well-trained bank robbers. Alex Rocco as a no-nonsense bank robber, and Peter Boyle as the stoolie/hit-man.

The movie however is stolen by the late Steven Keats. Keats plays a gun runner who sells machine guns out of the trunk of his sport's car. The friends of Eddie Coyle is extremely well-acted, grittly filmed, and low-key. It has a brutally shocking and surprising ending. An outstanding movie which for some strange reason hasn't found it's way to DVD or video.