stephen , please post if appropriate . 
 " mafia ! " - crime isn't a funny business by homer yen ( c ) 1998 
on a particular night when i found myself having some free time , i had a chance to either go to sleep early or to see " mafia ! " , a spoof of mafia and crime films such as " the godfather , " " goodfellas " and " casino " . 
at 84 minutes in length , i thought that i could enjoy a few laughs before getting a good nights sleep . 
but by my account , i think that my laff-o-meter only registered a few grins , one giggle , and maybe one chortle . 
i suppose that you could justify your time as homage to the venerable hollywood star , lloyd bridges , who just recently passed away and whose last performance was in this film . 
 " mafia ! " 
chronicles vincenzo cortino's ( lloyd bridges ) life . 
separated from his family when he was young , he escapes to america and tries to live an honest life . 
but as fate would have it , vincenzo grows up to be a powerful and klutzy crime lord . 
following in his footsteps are his two sons , joey ( billy burke ) and anthony ( jay mohr ) . 
like all siblings in powerful crime families , they squabble over power , the future of the family , fortune , and women . 
 " mafia ! " is co-written by jim abrahams , who also contributed to some gut-busting funny spoofs such as " airplane " and " the naked gun . " 
but these previous movies were funny because the jokes seemed more universally understood and there was more of a manic silliness at work . 
as i write this , i also wonder how many people have actually seen the movies on which this spoof is based . 
crime movies in general contain a lot of profanity and violence . 
it's a tough genre to parody . 
i was kind of hoping that they could somehow spoof the profanity used in all of those crime movies , maybe by having all of the tough crime lords say " please " as they decide which sector to take over , but this opportunity was never explored . 
there were one or two moments that made me smile such as the scene where vincenzo is dancing with his newly wed daughter-in-law . 
a gunman shoots him several times . 
the impact of the bullets cause him to make these wild contortions that force the wedding band to change music styles to keep up with him , from the samba to disco to the macarena . 
i think that i just gave away the best part of the film . 
oh well , that just means that you can go to sleep a little earlier .