“My characters aren’t nasty; they’re troubled.”

Harvey Keitel is not wrong. Or anyway, not entirely wrong; there are a few characters where I could probably argue the point. Not that I would, because why would you argue a point with Harvey Keitel? I get no impression that he’s violent in real life, but there is something ominous about him. Something that makes you think maybe you shouldn’t risk it.

The movie of his I’ve watched most recently, however, is Thelma & Louise, and I wish he got more roles like that. He plays a lot of mobsters. A Nazi or two, despite being Jewish. Criminals of various sorts. But Hal is definitely a nice guy. An actual nice guy, not a Nice Guy (TM). He really is genuinely trying to help the heroines, and he genuinely is aware that things have conspired against them through no real fault of their own. He wants to help them, but he’s not sure if he can.

The main difference between Hal and Charlie of Mean Streets in that regard is which side of the law they’re falling on. They are both basically trying to help people they know to be doomed, if you think about it. I mean, not that I’ve seen Mean Streets in some time, but that is kind of what’s going on there, isn’t it? The thing I remember finding interesting about that movie is how tortured Charlie was, how he wanted to be the Good Guy and just didn’t feel like he ever could be, because his best talent is, well, killing people.

I am not inclined to put together a Harvey Keitel Body Count—for one thing, there are a lot of his movies that I don’t want to see. And in some of his most famous roles, for all he’s playing intimidating figures, he’s playing intimidating figures who don’t actually kill anyone. The Wolf doesn’t, though it’s suggested that he could, should he have to. But that isn’t really where his strengths lie. Still, even without getting into perhaps his oddest role, he has killed a lot of people onscreen.

Or, if we are going to get into his oddest role, betraying them to their deaths. It isn’t just that he’s friends with Scorsese that led to his casting in The Last Temptation of Christ. Judas with a Brooklyn accent is a little unusual, sure, but Keitel plays tortured so well that it works. It’s a Judas who is complicated, and that’s the best kind. The themes don’t work if Judas isn’t conflicted about what he’s doing, especially in that particular telling of the story. Scorsese is, yes, one of those directors who likes having familiar people around him, but that doesn’t mean he would have cast someone completely wrong for one of the pivotal roles in the film.

I suspect it’s too late for him to get away from the typecasting, even though he also appears in terrible-looking Adam Sandler comedies. (Is there any other kind?) Even there, I’m pretty sure he plays the heavy. Of course, compared to Adam Sandler, who doesn’t seem equipped to play the heavy?