Top Movie Gangsters

"As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster." Martin Scorsese's epic gangster tale of the rise and fall of mobster Henry Hill, played by Ray Liotta, is rightly acclaimed as one of the best gangster movies of all time, ably assisted by Robert De Niro & Joe Pesci as a couple of nasty-minded henchmen!

"Say hello to my little friend!" Al Pacino's testosterone-fulled 180mph performance is one of the most frenetic ever committed to celluloid. Pacino hams it up as Cuban immigrant Tony Montana, swiftly rising from penniless nobody to king of the Miami drugs underworld.

A small man but an explosive package. Joe Pesci has made his name playing twisted psychopaths in mob movies such as Goodfellas and Casino. In Casino Pesci plays mob enforcer Nicky Santoro who helps smooth bookmaker Sam Rothstein's (Robert De Niro) introduction as a key crime figure in Las Vegas.

"I'm going to make him an offer he can't refuse." The classic movie mobster portrayal, Marlon Brando set the template for all to follow. Brando deliberately underplays the role with an air of quiet menace rather than any histrionics or shoot-em-up scenes and the performance is all the more powerful.

Another compelling turn from De Niro as gangster Neil Macauley in Michael Mann's sprawling gangster epic which centrres around a robbery that eventually goes wrong as cop Al Pacino hunts De Niro down through the LA streets.

Michael Caine's vicious London gangster Jack Carter takes a trip up North to find the killer of his brother, trading in shotguns, cool trenchcoats and Cockney insults!

No one is more suited to the role of psychopath gangster overlord than the menacing Christopher Walken who specialises in roles 'on the edge'.