It's a great idea: children playing the parts of hard-hearted gangsters implies that many of plots of the classic gangster films depend upon adults' childish behavior.

Bugsy Malone - Rotten Tomatoes Bugsy Malone - Rotten Tomatoes

The idea spoofs gangster movies perhaps in the way that Prizzi's Honor intended, and making the film a musical only adds to the film's conceit. All the cast are children and Bugsy Malone is one of the few films in which child actors I believe should win or at least be nominated for great acting achievment awards. For those of you who have your Java enabled you can see the lyrics in the form of a Java 'PopUp' box.Fat Sam (John Cassisi), Bugsy (Scott Baio) and Tallulah (Jodie Foster) are kids playing adults in Roaring '20s New York.

Paul Williams Discography 1975 to 2006

And the film deals with gangster violence creatively: director Alan Parker couldn't have a child version of Joe Pesci stabbing the hell out of somebody with his mother's kitchen knife without significant ethical problems with the depiction of children and violence. Blousey - a character who would've been better played by Jodie Foster - and Bugsy's courtship fails to compel because her rejection of him comes off as entitled and bitchy. By the end of the film, it has broken all its own rules, and I couldn't help but feel quite disappointed. This is the beginning of the film dropping its intelligent conceit, a denigration that is made complete during the final shootout.