Capturing its subject in a similar fashion to the Maysles brothers, Jennie Butler’s Georgie is an engrossing mini-doc about what happens to old mobsters when the rackets are through with them.
George Martorano, son of Raymond ‘Long John’ Martorano, followed his old man into the family business. During the time of plenty in the 70s and 80s, Georgie did his old man proud. Taking care of business and making some serious bank to go along with it.
But we’ve all seen enough gangster pictures by now to know. The mobster’s way is seldom without consequence and peril, especially after living high on the hog whilst breaking all the laws in the book at the same time. All good things end, and soon, Georgie was headed for the slammer for almost three decades.
“…what happens to old mobsters when the rackets are through with them.”
Butler’s film captures beautifully what Frank Darabont did in The Shawshank Redemption, which is the portrait of a character who has spent a large chunk of his life confined. And, to add insult to injury, Martorano lost his father, wife, and son, all within a two-year period.
With Georgie, you’ll experience the world through the eyes of a man out of time. As the Maysles delivered to us with Grey Gardens, so now does Jennie Butler present a figure that has outlived a world and now sits silently in the wake of history.
Martorano’s mind is alive with shadows of the past dancing about him as he reflects on what was. The man lets us into the reality of what happens when a way of life ends and we are dragged painfully into change, with nothing but memories to comfort us as time waits for no one.
Georgie is an albeit fleeting yet fascinating sketch of a rich, charismatic, and complicated life. It’s the stuff of great documentaries.
"…the stuff of great documentaries."
