Ragazzo americano

American Boy: A Profile of Steven Prince (1978)

*** (out of 4)

Sandwiched between New York, New York and The Last Waltz, director Martin Scorsese decided to make a short documentary on the life of Steven Prince. Don't know who Prince is? He's not wildly known but fans of Scorsese will recognize him as the gun salesman from Taxi Driver. Scorsese just puts the camera on Prince and lets him tell a variety of stories ranging from his heroin use to his early days growing up in New York with his parents. Scorsese is often times in the camera frame just listening, having fun and constantly laughing at the stories being told. This is a rather hard film to judge but it does only run 55-minutes so at least it doesn't go on too long. It's hard to judge because Prince is such a strange character that you can't help but keep watching him just to see what he's going to say next but at the same time I must admit that I didn't care too much for him. He certainly knows how to tell a story as his body movements are always moving along with the stories but I wondered how much of this was due to drugs. There's not too much visual style going on as Scorsese just keeps the camera on Prince and lets him do his thing. The interviews are well constructed but again, this is for fans of Scorsese who must see everything he's done. The film has gained a lot of attention over the past several years since Prince tells a story about an adrenaline shot that was pretty much lifted word for word by Tarantino in Pulp Fiction.