The gay man.

Dude, it was the 70's, just be glad it even had a full-on gay character in it.

And by the way, stereotypes come from guys acting/speaking exactly like this guy (sorry, I live in Amsterdam and I know). So what is it: stereotype, or a believable re-enactment of a common type of homosexual male?

Did anything bad happen to the guy because he was gay? Nope. Was he at the receiving end of some comic relief because he was? Nope. Was he in the car to pick up Keitel and his boys and pose a threat to their masculanity? No. He was just there because it's the 70's in New York.

Please rein in your anachronistic political-correctness. You'll enjoy more movies, and you probably live longer too. ;-)

I agree with the OP. Playing a flamboyant gay character for laughs is not necessarily bad (see Family Guy or South Park), but this one was a cringingly bad performance, about the level of a seventh grader doing a f-a-g imitation. It all too obviously pandered to audience's prejudices.

i had a very different interpretation of this scene, and i thought it was relevant to the development of the film.

i was actually surprised at how tolerant of the gay men the main characters were. as these late 60's macho Italian tough guys we expect them to be homophobic (as they are to a degree, calling them *beep* and whatnot) but they still give them a ride in their car and i think this shows a little bit of the 'we are all in it together' attitude of living in a crowded community like Little Italy. they may be homophobic tough guys, but these guys were from their neighborhood so they let them ride in their car.

also, i don't know if his behavior was as much a gay stereotype as much as a very accurate portrayal of the way a lot of people behave when they are totally wasted.

The character of Johnny is funny, sure. Charming, perhaps. Friends since childhood. Ok. But he is a great liability to the organisation as a whole and I struggle to see why Charlie is so faithful to him. Johnny seems to have little respect for Charlie’s authority and Charlie seems to get very angry with Johnny on a regular basis. Either Charlie was never a leader in the first place, or the script is slightly weak – or worse still...de niro over acted.
Why on earth would Charlie risk his own future for a man who has no care for Charlie in that way? Charlie could have lost his life due the smart-ass antics of Johnny, and Charlie made this clear to him. Yet he still continued to act like a wild cowboy.
I understand that he bought him to the Fat man’s place to sort things out. Johnny went wild and things kicked off. That should be one lesson learnt.
Why did he let him talk such disrespect to important people when he knew there would be serious ramifications? Why did Charlie allow Johnny to get away with shooting his gun on the roof knowing it can attract wrong attention? Why did he let Johnny grapple with him causing the serious injury to his girlfriend? Why did Johnny get away with then screaming at him and telling him not to touch him when he had just caused the near-death of his girlfriend? And why did he stand aside as Johnny insulted and pointed a gun at a made guy? Why did he not intervene, why instead did he just shout at him after it was said and done? Why did he allow Johnny to then push him away when he was about to give Johnny a good telling off?
These situations are so much and so strong that it causes me to wonder about the authenticity of that part of storyline.

Honestly, I thought the gay guy was one of the most authentic and amusing parts of the story. This clearly wasn't acting, it was an actual heavily flamboyant homosexual, quite in character for the time. And it was interesting how aggressive/out he was, and how tolerant the other guys were towards him.

There are obnoxious gays, just as there are obnoxious straight people. (The same is true of minorities, etc.) If you want to complain about how such people ruin things for everyone else, that's one thing. But I'm not sure we should attack Scorsese for honestly depicting one such character. He also depicts annoying, douchebag, racist Italians -- and no one's complaining about that.

I'm honestly far more offended by the stereotypical depiction of the unbalanced Vietnam Vet.

(I do understand how this could be offensive to a non-flamboyant homosexual, though.)

Just to note, someone was saying how Charlie's devotion to JB didn't make sense. The whole point of the film is that Charlie is trying to find redemption through trying to help JB -- he's his cross to bear. Of course no one would help douchebag JB without some ulterior motivation. Here, it's religious.

I'm 99% positive that the character was included because he was real, ie represented the different people that populated these Mean Streers. I'll bet you any money that when Scorsese lived in that neighbourhood and had these experience, he knew someone who sounded and acted exactly like that gay man they gave the ride to from the bar.
Its not a fabricated stereotype, but a mirror of the people who exist there.

Considering that we still see this same stereotypical gay man in movies and on television shows, prevalent on a network cable channel's various programming *cough-Bravo-cough* shows, I didn't find him all that intrusive to the narrative.


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