jason butler harner vs christopher walkin

Jason butler harner vs christopher walkin driver#

Danny refuses to pay, crudely mocks Licavoli's Italian heritage, and vows, 'The Irishman's in business for himself now.'Īn outraged Licavoli has Danny's house blown up, but he and his girlfriend survive. Licavoli is chosen due to his close ties to the New York Mafia families and decides to charge Danny a 30% 'street tax' for doing business in Cleveland. Scalish dies, both Nardi and Licavoli are considered for succession. Danny narrowly escapes, and kills Birns with a car bomb. Birns and Danny have a falling out over who should pay the money back and Birns hires a hitman to kill Danny. Birns arranges a $70,000 loan from the Gambino family, but Birns' courier buys cocaine with the money and gets arrested. Having had enough, Danny's long suffering wife leaves him and takes their children.ĭanny wants to open an upscale restaurant and lounge and asks Birns for help.

Jason butler harner vs christopher walkin driver#

Danny is arrested, but released when Frato's driver tells Manditski that Danny acted in self-defense. Danny returns a single shot to Frato's head, killing him. An enraged Frato later starts shooting at Danny in a park. Sneperger is assigned to set a remote controlled bomb under Frato's car, but Danny sets it off as he is doing it. Nardi counsels him privately that Frato's refusal can not go unpunished.ĭanny learns from the FBI that Sneperger has returned to gambling and has become a police informant. Licavoli orders Danny to kill Frato, but Danny balks because Frato has ten children. Danny's crew terrorizes trash haulers into joining the union, but Danny's friend Mike Frato refuses. Nardi then brokers a deal with Mafia captain Jack Licavoli for Danny to force the city's garbage haulers to join a union Licavoli controls. Danny moves his unhappy wife and daughters back to Collinwood and Nardi gets him work as an enforcer for Jewish loan shark Shondor Birns. Broke and facing prison, Danny pleads to lesser charges in return for becoming an FBI informant. Cleveland police detective Joe Manditski, who grew up with Danny in Collinwood, arrests him. He improves the working conditions at the docks and starts doing business with Nardi.ĭanny's own corruption as union president is revealed in an exposé by the local newspaper. He kicks Merke out of his office, and is elected local union president. Danny provokes Buka into a fist fight and beats him unconscious. Corrupt labor union boss Jerry Merke finds out, demands a cut of Danny's profits, and sends his enforcer Joe Buka to kill him. In return for Sneperger's debt being forgiven, Danny supplies Nardi with goods stolen from the docks. Sneperger's gambling leaves him in a huge debt with Cleveland Mafia captain John Nardi. In 1960, Danny Greene and his childhood friends Billy McComber and Art Sneperger are longshoremen on the Cleveland docks. Kill the Irishman grossed $1,188,194 at the domestic box office, against a production budget of $12 million. The film received mixed reviews upon its release, with some reviewers criticizing the purported similarities to Martin Scorsese's Goodfellas. Most of the cast, including Stevenson and D'Onofrio, were in attendance as was Shondor Birns' niece. Kill the Irishman was released in the United States on Maand premiered at the Landmark Sunshine Cinema in New York City. Greene's death ultimately led to the demise of the Cleveland Mafia. After many failed attempts on Greene's life, he was assassinated on October 6, 1977, by contract killer Ray Ferritto.

After his conviction, Greene rose through the criminal underworld in Cleveland and waged war on the Mafia for control of the city. In 1964, he was convicted of embezzling $11,500 of the union's funds. He worked as a longshoreman on the Cleveland docks, until being chosen to serve as interim president of the International Longshoremen's Association in 1961. The film chronicles the rise and fall of Danny Greene. Production commenced in 2009, and filming took place in and around Detroit.

īefore entering production, Kill the Irishman had a troubled development stage that lasted over a decade. Written by Hensleigh and Jeremy Walters, it is based on the life of the Irish-American gangster Danny Greene, and was adapted from the book To Kill the Irishman: The War That Crippled the Mafia by Rick Porrello. Kill the Irishman is a 2011 American biographical crime film directed by Jonathan Hensleigh, and starring Ray Stevenson, Vincent D'Onofrio, Christopher Walken, and Val Kilmer.