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Why Casino's Nicky Santoro Is One Of The Most Terrifying Villains In Film History
Mar 31, 2025
For many there are a few seminal Mob related movies made in the last 50 years. Films like The Godfather Goodfellas, The Departed, have all crafted some of the best characters in film. But Martin Scorsese's Casino delivers one of the best villains of them all with Joe Pesci's Nicky Santoro. Casino gives us a real dynamic between our main anti-heroes, and Nicky Santoro will forever be one of the best.
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I'm what counts out here, not your f***ing country clubs or your f***ing TV shows
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Not many characters in film's history have cast this long a shadow of intimidation
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both verbally and physically, as Nicky Santoro. Through his brutality, ruthlessness, and intimidation, he has become what our minds drift to when we think of a mob enforcer
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But what exactly is it about this moment of teetering suspense that makes him one of
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film's most iconic villains. Casino was released in 1995, directed and co-written by Martin Scorsese
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from the book Casino, Love and Honor in Las Vegas by Nicholas Pelleggi. The film marked a return to
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the mafia genre for Scorsese, working as a spiritual successor to Goodfellas. Only now more stylized
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more aggressive, and more overt in its ideals, it was the story of different types of criminals
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gone west to oversee the fictional casino Tangiers or the mafia back home. Back home being the only
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way Scorsese and Pileggi were legally allowed to refer to Chicago. Sam, logical and calm
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was to be the front-facing public persona of Tangiers, while Nicky set himself up as the
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brutal arm, keeping the operations in order through violence and intimidation. Throughout
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the film we see the two balance one another often reacting to or working in tandem as they navigate
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the criminal empire and political mire in which they become engrossed but after each begins to
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resent the other for what they see as bringing unwanted attention from both law enforcement
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and their own mafia family nikki reveals his capacity for true terror and it begins here in
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the desert nikki is cunning at first coordinating the meeting to his advantage before he even appears
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Nicky knows Sam fears the desert, so he takes it one step further by arranging the meeting
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a few hundred yards off the main road. Sam knows the area is littered with bodies of men
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who have betrayed enforcers just like his friend Nicky Nicky also shows up later than Sam giving his number crunching friend time to wander over the holes and calculate his own odds of survival We see Nicky car barrel down the desert road
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It's a shot Scorsese plays up, letting the camera float, almost untethered as it tries to keep up
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with the car. The car itself seems unhinged, never steady, constantly wavering to the left
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and right over the dirt road. Scorsese then drives the point home
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by letting Sam's sunglasses fill the entire frame, Nicky's car speeding across the lenses
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This is all Sam can see, the oncoming Colossus. While he kept Goodfellas' camera more voyeuristic
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Scorsese wants his voice heard here, and he screams it through every frame
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As the car screeches to a halt, drums start to smother the symphonic score
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Then Nicky explodes from the driver's side, and even the camera pulls back
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almost afraid as well. We've seen Nicky move quickly before, full of purpose and intent
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but not towards Sam, not like this. Scorsese has called Casino a movie without a plot
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full of action and story, but no plot whatsoever. It would be easy to point out the various moments
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of action, heads crushed in vices, necks stabbed with pins, and one of film's most infamous car
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bombs. But here, we're given a different type of action scene, a visceral verbal assault. What
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What makes Nicky so alarming here is his immediate command of the conversation
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He knows Sam's greatest strength is his ability to talk himself out of any situation
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so Nicky leaves him no time to think on his feet or adapt
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He escalates the meeting to a shouting match before any sort of formalities or questioning
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Even in the wide breadth of the Desert Vistas, their shouting becomes tight and cramped
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like a knife fight in a phone booth. The cool and collected Sam tries his hardest
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to steer the conversation. But Nicky is a profanity-laden steamroller, and when Sam attempts to explain, he's forcefully interrupted and silenced by his partner
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Do you remember where I told you? Back up a f***ing minute here, one minute. I asked you when the f did I ever ask you if I could come out here While it would be easy to assume their friendship would keep Sam safe it is exactly that relationship that adds to the intensity of the scene Sam knows Nikki He has seen firsthand the unpredictability of the Enforcer
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As Nikki wails on, we see Sam slightly retreat, desperate to find any tactic to hold his ground
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Scorsese knows to let his actors drive this moment. He dials back any sort of shot that could distract
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from the powerhouse performances of Pesci and De Niro. You get the genuine feelings of anger, shock, and desperation of every moment
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As the desert argument wears on, we can't help but think back to our time with Nicky
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He has proven again and again to be unpredictable in his behavior and violence
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There's a scene early on in the movie where a bar patron accosts Sam for seemingly no reason
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Sam himself states that while he was questioning why the guy acted that way
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Nicky just hit him. In fact, Nicky did more than just hit him. He repeatedly stabbed the man in the throat with a pin
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until they were wheezing on the floor. Even when he gets what he wants, it's impossible to predict what his response might be
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Pesci walks this line so well. He embodies this threat. His posture, his mannerisms, everything about the performance
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is deftly untethered, yet somehow perfectly contained. The Enforcer has long since come to grips with the idea
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that this is who he is, a criminal and a violent one at that
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Being a made man, Nicky understands the inevitability of his life. It's possible he may end up in prison or dead, but it's an outcome that neither concerns or phases him
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There's no greater shame to a man like Nicky than being made to look weak in front of his bosses
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And at this moment, standing over the hidden graves of the desert, he feels Sam is making him look weak
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Nicky berates Sam repeatedly for his appearances on a local TV show
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While Sam sees it as making himself a known figure in the public and political eye
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Nikki views it as drawing attention to them both. Protagonists and antagonists are generally diametrically
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opposed in their wants and needs. It's simple storytelling. To Nikki, Sam's self-congratulatory public persona
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runs against stream to how he views the mafia existence something the public eye can only make out in silhouette if they squint just right But Sam craves the spotlight thinking he can manipulate and control every situation to his
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wants. And as Nicky continuously barrels over his friend, we catch the first glimpse that this
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situation is beyond Sam's control. What the f*** are you doing on TV anyhow? You know, I get calls
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from back home every f***ing day. They think you went batsh***. Part of what makes Nicky so
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terrifying is Pesci's performance. He embodies the demeanor, attitude, and even physical appearance
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of his real-life counterpart, Anthony the Ant Spolotro. So much so that when Pesci first appeared
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on set at the casino, several dealers working as extras almost fainted at the sight of him in
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character. They were noted as saying it was almost too much. His likeness, his posture, his swagger
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Those dealers knew where the demeanor took Spolotro. Much like Nicky, the Ant ran afoul of
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his gang and was murdered in the mid 80s. All of the meanness and disregard is perfectly captured
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as Nikki walks away from Sam, spitting profanity and threats in one more instance of having the
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last word. Nikki speeds away, leaving a cloud of dust to envelop Sam. It's a nice touch and a
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perfect way to book into scene by Scorsese, opening the scene with Sam, being terrified of
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the bodies riddled on the desert floor, covered by layers of dirt and ending with Sam covered in
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dirt in plain sight. Nicky terrifies us to this day as an unbridled id set loose in the deserts of Las Vegas
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And Pesci's performance is spot on, partly because we've seen him take turns like this before
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As Tommy DeVito in Goodfellas, Pesci still maintained an unruly chaos, carefully maintained
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steadfast acting. How the f*** am I funny? What the f*** is so funny about me
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Tell me. Tell me what's funny. Even though Nikki is often overshadowed by DeVito, Casino really is where Pesci dialed in the idea of a monster in a beautiful suit
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Nikki's character shows us what happens when our idea of a mobster becomes reality
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The truth is, nobody is safe. Not the family, not the best friend, not even themselves
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Everything is at the whim of pure unpredictability with a penchant for violence. Okay
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