This scene is portrayed through the eyes of henrys wife Karen, who is also narrating this scene. In this part of the film, henry is at the height of his mob career. The scene starts off when the pair sees that the line is too long to get into the club. Henry then takes Karen through a side door, which is the employees entrance, and a sort of behind the scenes area to the Copacabana club.
The camera goes quite close to his face so that the viewer can get a good sighting of henrys emotions whilst he is doing this because he is very happy at his moment in the film. The steadicam reveals how respected henry is in the area. Once through the kitchen of the club, they walk inside to see that all the tables are full. The camera then switches to the view of the restaurant boss, who shows his power by pointing to an empty spot in the floor. Then the waiters are seen to come out of nowhere with a table and a lamp. After they finally sit down, she asks him what he does for a living and henry calmly says I’m in construction. Again the camera is quite close to the actor and this shows henrys dominance due to the fact that the camera seems to be shying away from him. The most notable aspect of this entire scene is martin scoreceses use of cinematography; the scene is barely 3 minutes long. The lighting in this scene is very dark to show that there is a dark side to the Copacabana as it is later shown in the film, but the viewer is focused on the tables as the lamps on the table show the only amount of bright light in the shot. During the entire scene one camera follows the pair around the different areas of the club. The camera is only a few feet behind the couple, which puts the viewer at a personal distance. The camera flows and glides through the scene. The camera movements end when the couple sit down at a table. This stedicam shot, which lasts just over 3 minutes, is a stunning example of how camera movement can reveal character. The steadicam removes the need for edits and shows henry hills rising power and control. The scene only needed seven takes, which is surprising for the amount of choreography that would have had to go into making it. The lighting is also used very well when it comes to difficulty because the characters actually walk through five different lighting scenarios from outside to silhouette to the deep red corridor, to the bright grey kitchen area and then to the dark club itself.
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