What 1973 film marked Scorsese's first collaboration with Robert De Niro?

Mean Streets, released in 1973, marked Martin Scorsese’s first collaboration with Robert De Niro. The film established a creative partnership that later produced enduring works such as Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, Goodfellas, Cape Fear, Casino, and The Irishman.

De Niro plays John “Johnny Boy” Civello, a reckless young gambler whose debts and impulsive behavior endanger his friend Charlie Cappa, played by Harvey Keitel. Set largely in New York’s Little Italy, the film draws on Scorsese’s own upbringing and explores Italian-American identity, Catholic guilt, urban life, and organized crime.

Mean Streets was Scorsese’s third feature film and his first feature made substantially from his own personal vision. Director John Cassavetes encouraged him to make a more personal film after Scorsese worked on the Roger Corman production Boxcar Bertha. The result helped announce Scorsese as an important figure in the New Hollywood movement.

The film was made on a budget of about $650,000 and was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry in 1997. It is often confused with Taxi Driver, the later Scorsese–De Niro collaboration that made their partnership internationally famous.