''The Friends of Eddie Coyle'' is a 1973
America
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
n
neo-noir crime film
Crime films, in the broadest sense, is a film genre inspired by and analogous to the crime fiction literary genre. Films of this genre generally involve various aspects of crime and its detection. Stylistically, the genre may overlap and combine ...
starring
Robert Mitchum and
Peter Boyle
Peter Lawrence Boyle (October 18, 1935 – December 12, 2006) was an American actor. Known as a character actor, he played Frank Barone on the CBS sitcom ''Everybody Loves Raymond'' and the comical monster in Mel Brooks' film spoof ''Young Fra ...
and directed by
Peter Yates
Peter James Yates (24 July 1929 – 9 January 2011) was an English film director and producer.
Biography Early life
Yates was born in Aldershot, Hampshire. The son of an army officer, he attended Charterhouse School as a boy, graduated from ...
. The screenplay by
Paul Monash was adapted from the 1970 novel ''
The Friends of Eddie Coyle
''The Friends of Eddie Coyle'' is a 1973 American neo-noir 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 ...
'' by
George V. Higgins
George V. Higgins (November 13, 1939 – November 6, 1999) was an American author, lawyer, newspaper columnist, raconteur and college professor. He authored more than thirty books, including ''Bomber's Law,'' ''Trust,'' and ''Kennedy for the De ...
.
The film tells the story of Eddie Coyle (Mitchum), a small-time career hoodlum in the
Irish Mob in
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
,
. 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
Eddie Coyle is a low-level
gunrunner
Arms trafficking or gunrunning is the illicit trade of contraband small arms and ammunition, which constitutes part of a broad range of illegal activities often associated with transnational criminal organizations. The illegal trade of small arm ...
based out of
Quincy, Massachusetts
Quincy ( ) is a coastal U.S. city in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the largest city in the county and a part of Greater Boston, Metropolitan Boston as one of Boston's immediate southern suburbs. Its population in 2020 was 1 ...
. He supplies pistols to a bank robbery crew led by Jimmy Scalise and Artie Van, first obtaining the guns from a fellow gunrunner named Jackie Brown. At the same time, Coyle is facing several years of jailtime for a truck hijacking in
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...
set up by Dillon, who owns a local bar. Coyle cooperates with
ATF
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE), commonly referred to as the ATF, is a domestic law enforcement agency within the United States Department of Justice. Its responsibilities include the investigation and preven ...
agent
Agent may refer to:
Espionage, investigation, and law
*, spies or intelligence officers
* Law of agency, laws involving a person authorized to act on behalf of another
** Agent of record, a person with a contractual agreement with an insuranc ...
Dave Foley in order to get his sentencing cleared, but is unaware that Dillon is an informant for Foley; Dillon meets with Foley in person every week to receive $20 from him.
The crew kidnap Mr. Partridge, the manager of the South Shore National Bank, in order to rob the bank. They are successful and make a clean getaway. Afterward, Coyle meets with Foley to discuss his sentencing. Coyle tells him that he knows a gunrunner, Jackie, that he could potentially have Foley arrest in order to ease the sentencing; Foley sits on this idea. Meanwhile, Jackie meets a hippie couple in
Cambridge
Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...
who wish to purchase
M16 rifle
The M16 rifle (officially designated Rifle, Caliber 5.56 mm, M16) is a family of military rifles adapted from the ArmaLite AR-15 rifle for the United States military. The original M16 rifle was a 5.56×45mm automatic rifle with a 20-roun ...
s off of him. He reluctantly agrees to sell them in a discreet location at a specific time. Jackie then meets with Coyle who requires him to acquire guns for the next day. While unsure at first that he can complete the task, Jackie complies and heads to
Rhode Island
Rhode Island (, like ''road'') is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is the List of U.S. states by area, smallest U.S. state by area and the List of states and territories of the United States ...
later that night with an associate to get the guns, which he is successful in doing.
The crew rob a second bank, this time in
South Weymouth. Towards the end of the robbery, one of the tellers triggers a silent alarm and is shot dead by one of the robbers, requiring a hasty exit by the crew. They are able to flee without any police following them but become wanted for murder as a result. Afterward, Jackie meets Coyle in the parking lot of a
Dedham grocery store to deliver him the guns. Once the exchange is finished, Coyle calls Foley from a payphone to tip him off about Jackie's exchange with the hippie couple at the
Sharon train station. There, Foley and a group of agents watch the area from afar with
sniper rifle
A sniper rifle is a high-precision, long-range rifle. Requirements include accuracy, reliability, mobility, concealment and optics for anti-personnel, anti-materiel and surveillance uses of the military sniper. The modern sniper rifle is a por ...
s. The couple arrive and Jackie tells them to meet him elsewhere at a later time, as he believes that he is being watched. Once they leave, Foley and his team move in to make the arrest. Jackie recognizes the agents' cars and attempts to flee but is boxed in at the exit and put in handcuffs, immediately realizing that Coyle had set him up.
Coyle and Foley have another meeting, at which Foley says that Jackie's arrest was not enough to clear Coyle's sentence. In preparation for the third robbery, the crew move in to kidnap the bank's manager but are ambushed by Foley and other ATF agents and placed under arrest. The next day, Coyle decides to tip Foley off about Scalise and his crew but is unaware of their arrest. Foley shows him the arrest in the newspaper and departs, leaving Coyle anguished. Soon after, Dillon is told that a mob boss wants him to assassinate Coyle. Dillon invites Coyle out to a
Boston Bruins
The Boston Bruins are a professional ice hockey team based in Boston. The Bruins compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Atlantic Division in the Eastern Conference. The team has been in existence since 1924, making t ...
game at the
Boston Garden
The Boston Garden was an arena in Boston, Massachusetts. Designed by boxing promoter Tex Rickard, who also built the third iteration of New York's Madison Square Garden, it opened on November 17, 1928, as "Boston Madison Square Garden" (late ...
along with a hood whom Dillon claims is his "wife's nephew". At the game, Coyle becomes severely drunk and eventually passes out in the car ride afterward. The hood drives them to a discreet location, where Dillon shoots Coyle in the head. They swap out cars in the parking lot of a bowling alley and leave.
Dillon and Foley meet outside
Boston City Hall the next day, where Foley thanks Dillon for giving him Scalise and his crew. Foley is largely unconcerned that Dillon cannot tell him who murdered Coyle, leaving the impression that he knows Dillon is involved but likely would not have pursued the killing of Coyle himself. After they finish conversing, they walk away in separate directions.
Cast
*
Robert Mitchum as Eddie Coyle
*
Peter Boyle
Peter Lawrence Boyle (October 18, 1935 – December 12, 2006) was an American actor. Known as a character actor, he played Frank Barone on the CBS sitcom ''Everybody Loves Raymond'' and the comical monster in Mel Brooks' film spoof ''Young Fra ...
as Dillon
*
Richard Jordan as Dave Foley
*
Steven Keats as Jackie Brown
*
Alex Rocco
Alex Rocco (born Alessandro Federico Petricone Jr.; February 29, 1936 – July 18, 2015) was an American actor. Known for his distinctive, gravelly voice, he was often cast as villains, including Moe Greene in ''The Godfather'' (1972) and his Pr ...
as Jimmy Scalise
*
Joe Santos as Artie Van
*
Mitchell Ryan as Waters
*
Helena Carroll as Sheila Coyle
*
Jack Kehoe as The Beard
*
Margaret Ladd
Margaret Ladd (born November 8, 1942) is an American actress, best known for her role as Emma Channing in the CBS primetime soap opera, ''Falcon Crest'' (1981–90).
Life and career
Ladd was born in Providence, Rhode Island. She began acting on ...
as Andrea
*
James Tolkan as The Man's Contact Man
* Peter MacLean as Partridge
Production
Filming took place throughout the
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
area, including
Government Center in Boston, and
Dedham,
Cambridge
Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...
,
Milton
Milton may refer to:
Names
* Milton (surname), a surname (and list of people with that surname)
** John Milton (1608–1674), English poet
* Milton (given name)
** Milton Friedman (1912–2006), Nobel laureate in Economics, author of '' Free t ...
,
Quincy,
Sharon
Sharon ( he, שָׁרוֹן ''Šārôn'' "plain") is a given name as well as an Israeli surname.
In English-speaking areas, Sharon is now predominantly a feminine given name. However, historically it was also used as a masculine given name. In I ...
,
Somerville
Somerville may refer to:
*Somerville College, Oxford, a constituent college of the University of Oxford
Places
*Somerville, Victoria, Australia
* Somerville, Western Australia, a suburb of Kalgoorlie, Australia
* Somerville, New Zealand, a subur ...
,
Malden, and
Weymouth,
.
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
The ''Boston Herald'' is an American daily newspaper whose primary market is Boston, Massachusetts, and its surrounding area. It was founded in 1846 and is one of the oldest daily newspapers in the United States. It has been awarded eight Pulit ...
'' at the time, claimed that Mitchum wanted to meet
Whitey Bulger
James Joseph "Whitey" Bulger Jr. (; September 3, 1929 – October 30, 2018) was an American organized crime boss who led the Winter Hill Gang in the Winter Hill neighborhood of Somerville, Massachusetts, a city directly northwest of Bost ...
and was warned against it by Higgins. What is claimed instead is that cast member
Alex Rocco
Alex Rocco (born Alessandro Federico Petricone Jr.; February 29, 1936 – July 18, 2015) was an American actor. Known for his distinctive, gravelly voice, he was often cast as villains, including Moe Greene in ''The Godfather'' (1972) and his Pr ...
, who grew up in Somerville, introduced Mitchum to
Howie Winter of the
Winter Hill Gang.
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 (when it was released mid-year) or 1974, and failed to recoup its estimated $3 million 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
Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...
of the ''
Chicago Sun-Times
The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the ''Chicago T ...
'' gave it four stars, his highest rating, while
Vincent Canby
Vincent Canby (July 27, 1924 – October 15, 2000) was an American film and theatre critic who served as the chief film critic for ''The New York Times'' from 1969 until the early 1990s, then its chief theatre critic from 1994 until his death in ...
of ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' also reviewed it favorably, calling it "a good, tough, unsentimental movie". Both reviewers singled out Mitchum's lead performance as a key ingredient of the film's success. Ebert wrote: "Eddie Coyle is made for him
itchum 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."
On
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
, the film holds a rating of 98% from 40 reviews.
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
The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and capable of sto ...
version on April 28, 2015.
See also
*
List of American films of 1973
References
External links
*
*
*
''The Friends of Eddie Coyle: They Were Expendable''an essay by Kent Jones at the
Criterion Collection
The Criterion Collection, Inc. (or simply Criterion) is an American home-video distribution company that focuses on licensing, restoring and distributing "important classic and contemporary films." Criterion serves film and media scholars, cinep ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Friends Of Eddie Coyle
1973 films
1973 crime films
American crime films
1970s English-language films
Films scored by Dave Grusin
Films based on American novels
Films about the Irish Mob
Films directed by Peter Yates
Films set in Boston
American neo-noir films
Films shot in Dedham, Massachusetts
1970s American films