Once Upon a Time in America

David Aaronson “Noodles,” a poor young Jewish man, meets Maximilian Bercovicz “Max,” another young man of Hebrew descent willing to go far by any means, in the early 20th-century slums of Manhattan, New York. They form a close friendship and, with 3 of “Noodles’s” friends, Patrick Goldberg “Patsy,” Philip Stein “Cockeye,” and Dominic, build a gang that quickly prospers. Unfortunately, they are hunted down by Bugsy, the man Noodles and his friends had previously worked for, and during one of their heists he kills Dominic. Noodles immediately lunges at him and kills him, and as a result he serves 12 years in prison. When Noodles gets out of prison, Max greets him; he has kept the gang going with the other 2 friends, Patsy and Cockeye. Soon, among the 4, they become, during Prohibition, some of the biggest gangsters in the entire country.