Henry Hill (Ray Liotta) is not white. At least, he isn’t by the standards Richard Dyer sketches out in his essay on the topic of whiteness. Because, according to Dyer, whiteness is defined as the “norm,” the standard, and the commonplace – the thing against which all “otherness” is measured – and the life Hill seeks out and establishes for himself throughout the film is anything but these things.
The very first scene shows Hill driving in a car with his fellow wiseguys. Another mafioso just happens to be in the trunk of the car, thrashing about. Needless to say, it does not take long for Hill to pull the car over, get out, open the trunk, and silence the guy forever. Is this normal behavior? No, and it is only the beginning of the things Hill does that exemplify how far from the norm he deviates. Throughout the course of the film, he lies, he cheats, he steals, he deals drugs, and he exerts violence on people who don’t want to do as he tells them to.
His first attempt at something resembling “suburban” life (and thus, at a “normal” white life) – shortly after he is released from his first stint in prison – fails miserably because he goes about it the wrong way. The house he and his family moves into is funded by illicit activity, and though they are the ones who got him into trouble in the first place, he continues to keep ties with the wiseguys. At this point, he is still not white.
It is not until after his second imprisonment that things really begin to turn around. Hill reevaluates his life and makes the decision to provide a full confession – true, it is more out of fear than anything, but it is a step in the right direction. He rats on the other mafiosos – the embodiments of the strong ethnic identity Hill related to for so long – and enters the witness protection program. He becomes “an average nobody,” and while those he ratted on go to prison, Hill moves to the suburbs and lives “the rest of [his] life like a schnook.” He finally becomes white.
