The 2012 film "The Iceman" presents the story of Richard Kuklinski, a man convicted of multiple murders who claimed to have worked as a contract killer for organized crime. The movie was loosely based on his life, but a former mobster who spent 25 years on the street says the film is largely fabrication.
Michael Francis, who was part of the Colombo crime family, reviewed the film and offered his perspective on Kuklinski's real life. He said he did not like the movie and found it very dark. He also said he never heard Kuklinski's name mentioned once during his quarter-century in the life.
Kuklinski claimed to be a close associate of Roy DeMeo, a Gambino family figure known as a contract killer. He also claimed to have carried out killings for all five families. Law enforcement could not corroborate any of those claims, according to Francis.
DeMeo was known for luring victims to the Gemini Lounge and killing them in the basement, where bodies were dismembered. Francis said that story is true and that he knows it for a fact. But he said Kuklinski was in a different league entirely.
Kuklinski did two HBO documentaries from prison, where he was serving a life sentence. Francis described him as a sociopath, a psychopath, and a pathological liar. He said law enforcement could not corroborate the roughly 100 to 200 killings Kuklinski claimed.
The attorney general in New Jersey, Francis said, conducted a thorough investigation and could only confirm perhaps 15 killings. That, he added, is bad enough. But the rest could not be verified by authorities anywhere in the country.
Kuklinski's childhood was brutal. His father beat his younger brother to death in front of Kuklinski and the rest of the family, then claimed the boy fell down the stairs. The family went along with the story because they feared him, and he got away with the murder.
His father also beat Kuklinski, the mother, and all the children regularly. Kuklinski hated his father and called his mother a cancer, apparently because she never stopped the beatings.
As a young teenager, Kuklinski beat a classmate to death with his fists after claiming the boy was bullying him. He then pulled out the victim's teeth and cut off the fingertips so the body could not be identified, a method he had seen on a crime show.
When asked about it later in life, he said he felt nothing and that it did not bother him one bit. He said it was the first time in his life he felt powerful. A couple of years later, as a teenager, he killed someone else and again felt nothing.
Francis acknowledged that people are products of their environment in many ways. But he noted that many people who grow up in tough situations choose a different path, deciding they never want their families to go through what they endured. Some, he said, become a Richard Kuklinski instead.
In the film, Kuklinski is portrayed as a loving father and husband, presented as his one redeeming quality. Francis said he believes Kuklinski did love his family, but he struggles to understand how a man like that could have any love in him.
His wife Barbara later wrote a book claiming he beat her, tried to smother her with a pillow, tried to run her over with his car, and broke her nose multiple times. Kuklinski also told their children that if he ever beat their mother to death, he would have to kill them too.
Kuklinski claimed to have killed a police officer in a contract killing ordered by the Gambino family. He said Sammy Gravano was involved and gave him the orders. Authorities approached Gravano and offered him a plea with no additional time, but he refused, saying he did not know what Kuklinski was talking about.
Kuklinski was set to testify against Gravano, but Kuklinski died and the case was dropped. Francis said he believes Gravano in this instance, calling it just another example of Kuklinski lying.
In real life, Kuklinski killed homeless people for sport and sought out different methods of killing. He used cyanide because it left no trace, strangled people, shot them with a bow and arrow, and knifed them. He killed in every way imaginable, according to Francis.
Francis also pushed back on the idea of paid contract killings. He said that when someone takes the oath to become a made man, they agree to do whatever they are told, and they have to prove they are capable before taking that oath. They do not get paid for hits, he said.
In 25 years, Francis said he could not point to one person he knew who got paid to do a hit. It has happened, he acknowledged, but it is absolutely rare. He said mob families had roughly 115 made guys, with only about 20 real earners, and the rest hanging around no-show jobs and union positions.
Kuklinski once said in an interview that he would not do anything for less than five or six figures. Francis called that nonsensical, asking why mob guys would pay six figures to someone when they had 90 capable men sitting around who had to do it or face jeopardy.
Kuklinski was ultimately convicted of five murders, and they were not mob-related. He was caught through his own misdeeds during a law enforcement investigation, not through a mob informant. Francis said no informant he was aware of ever pointed a finger at Kuklinski for anything mob-related.
Kuklinski was a sickly man in prison and contracted a disease of his internal organs. He had an order that he wanted to be resuscitated if something happened to him, but his wife Barbara, who had left him, overruled it. He died in prison without being resuscitated.
Francis said the film's acting was great. Ray Liotta was terrific as Roy DeMeo, Michael Shannon was great as Richard Kuklinski, and Winona Ryder did a great job as his wife. But he said the story was 90 percent fabrication and should be watched almost as a purely fictional movie.
He described Kuklinski not as a serial killer but as a predator who preyed on people with no remorse. He said Kuklinski was just a bad seed, and unfortunately those people do exist.
Francis also spoke about the destruction of the family in America. He said he went to prison with many young men aged 21 to 23, and the same script could be written for every one of them: a broken home, no father figure, a mother trying her best or struggling with her own problems.
When those kids grow up, he said, they go to the street because they received no teaching, counseling, or love at home. They meet the local drug dealer or gangbanger, try to earn a few bucks, and end up in prison or worse. He urged parents to do the right thing with their children, because society will eventually receive what they turn out to be.
As a Christian, Francis said he cannot judge what happened to Kuklinski on his deathbed. He said he does not know if Kuklinski ever read the Bible or if anyone shared faith with him in prison. He said Christians believe that sincere repentance and acceptance of Jesus Christ brings salvation, a concept he acknowledged is hard for many to accept.
Francis said he was not recommending the film, though many people had asked him to review it. He said Kuklinski's real life is more interesting and more gruesome than the movie, and that anyone curious should look into the HBO documentaries and books about him.