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Some like their comedy hot and some like it cold. Billy Wilder opted to step on the joke accelerator to see what top speed looked like. One of the most finely tuned comedies ever made, this political satire crams five hours’ worth of wit and sight gags into 115 minutes. The retirement-age James Cagney practically blows a fuse rattling through Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond’s high-pressure speeches, without slurring so much as a single syllable.

One, Two, Three

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1961 / B&W / 2:35 widescreen / 115 min. / Street Date May 30, 2017 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring James Cagney, Horst Buchholz, Pamela Tiffin, Arlene Francis,

Howard St. John, Hanns Lothar, Lilo Pulver

Cinematography Daniel L. Fapp

Production Designers Robert Stratil, Heinrich Weidemann

Art Direction Alexander Trauner

Film Editor Daniel Mandell

Original Music André Previn

Written by Billy Wilder, I.A.L. Diamond from the play by Ferenc Molnar

Produced and Directed by Billy Wilder

How...

The legendary 1978 Lufthansa heist retold in the classic 1990 masterpiece Goodfellas is back in the news today. 80-year-old Vincent Asaro was acquitted of all charges in the case against him. He walked out of federal court in Brooklyn on Thursday a free man. The not guilty verdict came after years of Asaro hiding in the shadows and adhering to a strict Mafia code of silence. He was accused of helping to plan the infamous heist.

Asaro was portrayed in court as a throwback to a bygone era, from a time when New York's five primary organized crime families made up a secret society. Its members were said to be hardened gangsters who settled their conflicts with bloodshed. The federal jury reached their verdict in the Brooklyn racketeering trial after a little more than two days of deliberations. The verdict left those in attendance stunned. About his character, Assistant U.S. Attorney...

Asaro, 78, is accused of helping to direct Lufthansa Airlines robbery, one of the largest cash thefts in American history

More than 30 years after hooded gunmen pulled a $6m airport heist dramatised in the hit Martin Scorsese movie Goodfellas, an elderly reputed mobster was arrested at his New York City home on Thursday and charged over the robbery and a 1969 murder.

Vincent Asaro, 78, was named along with his son Jerome and three other defendants in a wide-ranging indictment alleging murder, robbery, extortion, arson and other crimes from the late 1960s up until last year.

The Asaros, both identified as captains in the Bonanno organised crime family, pleaded not guilty and were held without bail at a brief appearance in federal court in Brooklyn.

The elder Asaro's lawyer, Gerald McMahon, told reporters outside court that his client was framed by shady turncoat gangsters, including the former Bonanno boss Joseph Massino, the highest-ranking...

The case of a notorious 1978 heist at New York's John F. Kennedy airport that inspired a plotline in Martin Scorsese's "Goodfellas" got a huge break on Thursday when the FBI apprehended one of its suspected participants.

The FBI arrested alleged mobster Vincent Asaro, now 78, for his purported role in the theft of $5 million in cash and $1 million in jewelry from a Lufthansa cargo building at JFK more than 35 years ago. At the time, it was the biggest cash heist ever in the United States; today, that haul would be worth approximately $20 million.

Long unsolved, ABC News reports that the Lufthansa heist "led to a massive, years-long investigative effort that ultimately proved fruitless as wiseguys and their associates believed involved in the robbery disappeared or died at the hands of nervous crime bosses."

One such crime boss, James "Jimmy the Gent" Burke, was believed to be the mastermind of the Lufthansa heist,...

Martin Scorsese's perfectly acted, brilliantly made Mafia saga is a chillingly scary, vibrant movie with a frightening blackly comic edge. Ray Liotta is at his finest as Henry Hill, a war baby who grows up with gangsters and dreams only of being one. He makes dangerous friends such as Jimmy the Gent (Robert De Niro) and Tommy DeVito (Joe Pesci, who won an Oscar), an unpredictable hit-man who only stops talking for long enough to shoot someone over some (often imagined) insult.

The death in Italy of James Gandolfini, who played Mafia boss Tony Soprano on the popular HBO show "The Sopranos," was part of an unusual convergence of mob-related news making headlines this week. Here's a look:

James Gandolfini'S Death

Gandolfini, whose portrayal of an emotionally delicate mob boss on one of TV's greatest drama series earned him three Emmy Awards, died Wednesday while on holiday in Rome, HBO and his managers said. Gandolfini, who was 51, played Soprano on the HBO series from 1999 to 2007. He also appeared in movies including "Zero Dark Thirty" and "Killing Them Softly."

The Search For Jimmy Hoffa

FBI agents with shovels on Monday began combing through dirt and mud in a weed-grown field north of Detroit looking for Hoffa's remains or clues to the disappearance of the former Teamsters boss, who many people suspect ran afoul of the mob. Detroit FBI chief Robert Foley said...

By Murray Weiss and Ben Fractenberg

Queens — The FBI began digging for a body Monday in the former Queens home of notorious mob power James “Jimmy The Gent” Burke, who was famously portrayed by Robert De Niro in the movie "Goodfellas," sources told DNAinfo New York.

FBI Evidence Collection specialists and agents from the Organized Crime Division descended into the basement of Burke’s family home at 81-48 102 Rd. in South Ozone Park around 8 a.m. armed with jackhammers and sledge hammers.

Sources said the feds recently obtained information from a new cooperating informant linked to the Gambino and Bonanno crime families who told them he believed a hood who disappeared decades ago was buried in Burke’s basement or backyard.

The sources say the dig is not related the fabled 1978 Lufthansa Heist, where Burke, portrayed as Jimmy Conway by De Niro in "Goodfellas," and his fellow wiseguys pulled off an $8 million robbery at JFK,...

Feature James Clayton Jan 11, 2013

With Gangster Squad out in UK cinemas, James assembles his own fantasy gang of movie mobsters...

Rat-a-tat-tat! Gangster Squad has hit town! This is great news for cinemagoers seeking sparks in the middle of grey, grim January. Slick mobster style! Machine gun-blastin’ action! Hollywood pizazz! Retro chic and period detail!

Gangster Squad also appeals with a stellar cast and the presence of Ruben Fleischer - an assured hand when it comes to directing high-octane entertainment - behind the camera. Nevertheless, the film has let me down slightly right from the start in that its title is misleading. “Gangster Squad” is not a ‘squad of gangsters’ but rather, less alluringly, ‘a police squad to tackle gangsters’.

The squad - Josh Brolin, Ryan Gosling, Anthony Mackie, Michael Peña, Gio Ribisi and Robert Patrick - are indubitably a very cool bunch. Furthermore, watching the Lapd come down hard on...

Check out the official poster for the upcoming independent drama Hard Boiled Sweets, featuring an ensemble cast including Paul Freeman, Ty Glaser and Scot Williams.

Ex-con Johnny (Scot Williams) is forced into pulling a heist he wants nothing to do with. Mob boss ‘Shrewd’ Eddie (Paul Freeman) has one million in dirty cash stashed at his home, just waiting to be stolen. But what Johnny doesn’t know is that seven other very dangerous criminals also have plans to steal the money…

Additional cast include Philip Barantini, Elizabeth Berrington, Adrian Bower, Liz May Brice, Laura Greenwood, Ian Hart, Nathaniel Martello-White, Danny Sapani, Peter Wrght, and René Zagger.

Here’s the synopsis for the film:

Mob Boss is used to getting whatever he wants; he runs Southend, gets all the best women including the gorgeous, sought after Porsche The Sherbet Lemon and has one million pounds in dirty cash stashed in a briefcase at his home.

A whole host of gangsters, pimps, low-lifes, call-girls, ex-cons and bent cops move in and out of each other’s lives during a couple of busy days in Southend-on-Sea in Essex. Jimmy The Gent (Peter Wight) is up from London to see local big man Shrewd Eddie (Paul Freeman) and has a big wedge of cash on him, which seemingly everyone has a plan to lay hold of. But who will be left sitting pretty?

*****

The story of how this film came to the big (and now smaller) screen is labyrinthine but impressive. Writer and Director David Hughes had written a script for the short film that preceded it (A Girl and A Gun) and a music composer that he knew from his day job in film advertising offered to try to pass it to actor Ian Hart (Backbeat, Harry Potter, Enemy of the State), who he saw in the...

Hard Boiled Sweets

Stars: Philip Barantini, Elizabeth Berrington, Adrian Bower, Paul Freeman, Liz May Brice, Laura Greenwood | Written and Directed by David L.G. Hughes

Guy Ritchie has a lot to answer for. Following the success of his British gangster flick Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels we’ve had a myriad of rip-offs and wannabes of which Hard Boiled Sweets is one. Taking inspiration from Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction and Guy Ritchie’s aforementioned gangster flick, the film weaves together a number of different stories and characters into this tale of seaside gangsters – the trouble is right from the get-go you know exactly where the film is headed and how all the plot threads will come together; watching everything pan out as you’ve already guessed makes for very dull viewing!

The film follows mob boss ‘Shrewd’ Eddie (Freeman), a Southend-on-Sea gangster who is used to getting whatever he wants; he runs the town,...

Hard Boiled Sweets is hitting DVD and Blu-ray 30th April. It has a great cast which includes Philip Barantini, Elizabeth Berrington, Adrian Bower, Liz May Brice, Paul Freeman and Ty Glaser. In this exclusive clip from the movie, we get to see a particularly nasty Paul Freeman (who i will always knows as Dr. René Belloq from Raiders of the Lost Arc) enforcing his authority!

Mob Boss, ‘Shrewd’ Eddie – ‘The Gobstopper’ (Paul Freeman; Hot Fuzz, Raiders of the Lost Ark) is used to getting whatever he wants; he runs Southend, gets all the best women including the gorgeous, sought-after Porsche – ‘The Sherbet Lemon’ (Ty Glaser; Secret Diary of a Call Girl), and has one million pounds in dirty cash stashed in a briefcase at his home. However, nothing in this world comes without a price, and this weekend his boss and top-dog London Mobster, Jimmy The Gent (Peter Wight; My Week With Marilyn,...

This is a Runyonesque, Lock Stock… piece of violent mockney in which three, possibly four, teams of crooks are out to seize a million quid when London bagman Jimmy the Gent (Peter Wight) comes to a lurid Southend to collect protection money from Shrewd Eddie, the local Mr Big (Paul Freeman). Each character on first appearance is identified by their nickname and a form of confectionery that they jokily resemble (eg Shrewd Eddie is the Gob Stopper). The film is smart, though not as smart as it thinks. There are eight brutal murders, and this must be the first movie in which a gangster's moll likes to have sex with two men on the same day because she likes to feel the different sperms doing battle inside her.

CrimeDramaPhilip French

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★★☆☆☆ British gangster flick Hard Boiled Sweets (2012) is the feature length debut of writer and director David L.G. Hughes, and boasts an all-British cast including Peter Wight (My Week With Marilyn) and Elizabeth Berrington (In Bruges). The film follows the highs and lows of London crime boss Jimmy The Gent (Wight), who's recently fallen on hard times after new school gangster Leroy (Danny Sapani) moves in on his turf, demanding that Jimmy step down and pay him £1.5 million. Jimmy reluctantly agrees and proceeds to make his monthly tour of London to collect money from those who work for him, ending up in the seedy world of Southend.

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Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

There are certain cinematic genres that historically the British have always done well, and the gangster film is maybe at the top of the list. Think The Long Good Friday, Get Carter, or more recently the sumptuous Sexy Beast. Hard Boiled Sweets is David Hughes’ addition to the canon and, though it doesn’t last as long in the memory as those films mentioned, it more than holds its own, and is one of the stronger British gangster films of recent years.

Southend-on-Sea is best known for penny arcades, cheap B&Bs and donkey rides along the beach, but here it is home to a labyrinthine criminal underworld complete with sex, drugs, and bodies dredged up at low tide. Shrewd Eddie is the boss of the town, and he’s in a bad mood, because this weekend Jimmy The Gent, the big cheese in London, and more importantly,...

Espn knows sports, but their record with sports films is a totally different matter. Beginning with 2002's A Season on the Brink, they've hardly delivered a credible sports film worthy of their place at the top of the sports-entertainment heap. Who can forget Tom Sizemore's ill-fitting Pete Rose wig in Hustle or Oliver Platt's oversized harrumphing in The Bronx is Burning? Yesterday, the network announced plans to tackle Vince Lombardi, the legendary Green Bay Packers football coach whose name now graces the Super Bowl trophy, and this time, the network is pulling no punches. For one, the film will be a theatrical release,...