Goodfellas Quotes

If you’re part of a crew, nobody ever tells you that they’re going to kill you. It doesn’t happen that way. There weren’t any arguments or curses like in the movies. See, your murderers come with smiles. They come as your friends, the people who’ve cared for you all of your life, and they always seem to come at a time when you’re at your weakest and most in need of their help.

I’m proud of you. You took your first pinch like a man and learned the two greatest things in life. Look at me, never rat on your friends, and always keep your mouth shut.[to Henry]

For us to live any other way was nuts. To us, those goody-good people who worked s***ty jobs for bum paychecks and took the subway to work every day, worried about their bills, were dead. I mean, they were suckers. They had no balls. If we wanted something, we just took it. If anyone complained twice, they got hit so bad, believe me, they never complained again.

But still I couldn’t hurt him. How could I hurt him? I couldn’t even bring myself to leave him. The truth was that no matter how bad I felt I was still very attracted to him. Why should I give him to someone else? Why should she win?

And when the cops, they assigned a whole army to stop Jimmy, what did he do? He made them partners.

You know, we always called each other good fellas. Like you said to somebody, “You’re gonna like this guy. He’s all right. He’s a good fella. He’s one of us.” You understand? We were good fellas. Wiseguys. But Jimmy and I could never be made because we had Irish blood. It didn’t even matter that my mother was Sicilian. To become a member of a crew you’ve got to be one hundred per cent Italian so they can trace all your relatives back to the old country. See, it’s the highest honor they can give you. It means you belong to a family and a crew. It means that nobody can f*** around with you. It also means you could f*** around with anybody just as long as they aren’t also a member. It’s like a license to steal. It’s a license to do anything. As far as Jimmy was concerned with Tommy being made, it was like we were all being made. We would now have one of our own as a member.

Thirty-two hundred bucks. That’s what he gave me. Thirty-two hundred bucks for a lifetime. It wasn’t even enough to pay for the coffin.[about Paulie]

I know there are women, like my best friends, who would have gotten out of there the minute their boyfriend gave them a gun to hide. But I didn’t. I got to admit the truth. It turned me on.

For most of the guys, killings got to be accepted. Murder was the only way that everybody stayed in line. You got out of line, you got whacked. Everybody knew the rules.

For a second, I thought I was dead. But when I heard all the noise, I knew they were cops. Only cops talk that way. If they had been wiseguys, I wouldn’t have heard a thing. I would have been dead.