The Friends of Eddie Coyle

The Friends of Eddie Coyle
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Peter Yates
Screenplay by	Paul Monash
Based on	The Friends of Eddie Coyle by George V. Higgins
Produced by	Paul Monash
Starring	Robert Mitchum Peter Boyle Richard Jordan Steven Keats
Cinematography	Victor J. Kemper
Edited by	Patricia Lewis Jaffe
Music by	Dave Grusin
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release date	June 26, 1973 (1973-06-26)
Running time	103 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

The Friends of Eddie Coyle is a 1973 American neo-noir^[1] crime film starring Robert Mitchum and Peter Boyle and directed by Peter Yates. The screenplay by Paul Monash was adapted from the 1970 novel The Friends of Eddie Coyle by George V. Higgins.

The film tells the story of Eddie Coyle (Mitchum), a small-time career hoodlum in the Irish Mob in Boston, Massachusetts. The title is purely ironic: Eddie has no friends.

While critical reception was positive, with particular praise for Mitchum's performance, the movie was not popular with filmgoers and failed to rank in the top 30 either in 1973 (when it was released mid-year) or 1974, and failed to recoup its budget in combined box office.

Plot[]

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A tightly-drilled crew of bank robbers successfully hits a suburban Boston bank. Their polished and economic actions suggest it isn't their first heist, and won't be their last.

Eddie Coyle is a low-level career criminal and defacto member of Boston's Irish Mob, clinging to the lower rungs of a bluecollar life in Quincy, Massachusetts. Still savvy and evidently trusted, he's nonetheless been ground down to supplying disposable pistols to the bank heist gang led by Jimmy Scalise. He plays hardball with a cocky yet still fledgling gunrunner named Jackie Brown to get them.

Coyle has been wanted for several years on a rumrunning charge in New Hampshire on a job set up by his friend Dillon, a barkeep at the dive Coyle and other low level local hoodlums frequent. Dillon is also a paid informant informant for agent Dave Foley of the Boston Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. Later, Coyle decides to go to Foyle and give up Brown in exchange for getting his sentence cleared.

Scalise's gang robs another bank. This time, the heist botched by a fatal shooting. They know they have at most one more payday before they have to quit.

Brown delivers a rush-job shipment of pistols to Coyle, casually dropping that he has a rendezvous set up later that afternoon in Sharon to deliver some M16s. He shows up at the train station car park and cases it out. As always, he's wary of the risks in front of him but not yet wise enough to cover his back. He gets pinched when an ATF stake-out closes in. Furious, he immediately knows who dropped the dime on him, and vows revenge.

Coyle hooks up with Foley to hear the good news on the Fed's meeting with the prosecutor in New Hampshire. Instead he's told the Brown tip was not enough, "Uncle" - Uncle Sam - needs more. Eddie's repulsed. He'd kept his mouth shut and did time covering for "the Man" behind it all before, even stood and took it when he had all his fingers on one hand broken for a small mess-up in a gun deal. Being a puke once was one thing, becoming a serial rat is too much. He refuses to play ball a second time.

Following their pattern, the Scalise gang shows up at a bank manager's suburban home to kidnap him and hold a family member's life as ransom while they do the job. Like Brown, they're ambushed by Foley and his ATF crew without firing a shot. Unaware of the bust, a desperate Coyle arranges a meeting with Foley the next day to turn Judas on the heist mob. Foley shows him the morning paper, leaving Coyle with nothing to trade and a jail cell dead ahead.

Devastated, he reels to Dillon's bar, where his pal treats him to the usual round of whisky with a beer chaser on the house. He confesses to Dillon he has no idea who turned the key on Scalise. The bar payphone rings and Dillon gets word he's to whack Coyle for ratting on the bank gang. He tells the caller Coyle is there right then, putting on the "he's so sorry" act hearing about the bust, and promises to do the job.

Getting right to work, Dillon serves up another free round and invites Coyle out to a Boston Bruins hockey game at the Garden later that night. Next, he meets with a noisy flak for "the Man", who impatiently demands action. He squares the little terrier up, telling him he's a pro who doesn't like being pushed, and demands $5,000 in advance. The yapdog scurries away to get it.

Dillon doesn't drive, and passes off the young thug playing chauffeur that night as his "wife's nephew". At the Garden Dillon ensures the still disconsolate Coyle gets blotto, oblivious that his host isn't joining him. On the ride home Coyle passes out. Dillon pops him in the head point blank with a .22 revolver, then has the punk slink their barge into a bowling alley parking lot to ditch the body. They pull alongside a car indistinguishable from their own, swap into it, and dissolve into the rain-spattered night.

The next morning Dillon and Foley meet as usual outside the Boston Federal Building. Foley gives the rat his weekly $20 like nothing happened, Scalise tip and all. Eddie Coyle's murder isn't even a bleep on his radar - or conscience. And Dillon is good with "the Man", good with "Uncle", and $5,020 richer. The pair skulk in opposite directions till next week's Andrew Jackson twists their crooked paths together again.

Cast[]

• Robert Mitchum as Eddie Coyle
• Peter Boyle as Dillon
• Richard Jordan as Dave Foley
• Steven Keats as Jackie Brown
• Alex Rocco as Jimmy Scalise
• Joe Santos as Artie Van
• Mitchell Ryan as Waters
• Helena Carroll as Sheila Coyle
• Jack Kehoe as The Beard
• Margaret Ladd as Andrea
• James Tolkan as The Man's Contact Man
• Peter MacLean as Partridge

Production[]

Filming took place throughout the Boston area, including Government Center in Boston, and Dedham, Cambridge, Milton, Quincy, Sharon, Somerville, Malden, and Weymouth, Massachusetts.^[2]

During the making of the film, Mitchum was interested in meeting the local gangsters as part of his research. Journalist George Kimball, a sports writer on the Boston Herald at the time, claimed that Mitchum wanted to meet Whitey Bulger and was warned against it by Higgins. What is claimed instead is that cast member Alex Rocco, who grew up in Somerville, introduced Mitchum to Howie Winter of the Winter Hill Gang.^[3]

Reception[]

The Friends of Eddie Coyle was not well-received by the filmgoing public. It failed to place in the top 30 in film revenue in 1973^[4] (when it was released mid-year)^[5] or 1974,^[6] and failed to recoup its estimated $3 million dollar budget in combined box office returns. It was, however, well-reviewed by some critics, and today is among the most highly regarded crime films of the 1970s by some. Upon its release Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave it four stars, his highest rating, while Vincent Canby of The New York Times also reviewed it favorably, calling it "a good, tough, unsentimental movie".^[7] Both reviewers singled out Mitchum's lead performance as a key ingredient of the film's success. Ebert wrote: "Eddie Coyle is made for [Mitchum]: a weary middle-aged man, but tough and proud; a man who has been hurt too often in life not to respect pain; a man who will take chances to protect his own territory."^[8]

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a rating of 98% from 40 reviews.^[9]

Home media[]

The Criterion Collection released a special edition DVD of the film on May 19, 2009. It included a director's commentary by Peter Yates, who died less than two years after the DVD came out. Criterion released a Blu-ray version on April 28, 2015.^[10]

See also[]

• List of American films of 1973

References[]

External links[]

Wikiquote has quotations related to: The Friends of Eddie Coyle

• The Friends of Eddie Coyle at IMDb
• The Friends of Eddie Coyle at AllMovie
• The Friends of Eddie Coyle at Rotten Tomatoes
• The Friends of Eddie Coyle: They Were Expendable an essay by Kent Jones at the Criterion Collection