When it comes to Robert De Niro’s greatest movies, the same titles tend to dominate the conversation. Goodfellas, Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, and The Godfather Part II have all become synonymous with the legendary actor’s career.<\/p>\n
But one 1993 film may deserve a little more attention.<\/p>\n
A Bronx Tale, which also marked De Niro’s directorial debut, has been called the actor’s “most underrated film” by No Film School<\/a>.<\/p>\n Robert De Niro Made His Directorial Debut With ‘A Bronx Tale’<\/p>\n Set in the Bronx during the 1960s, A Bronx Tale follows Calogero, a young boy who finds himself caught between two very different father figures.<\/p>\n On one side is his hardworking father, Lorenzo, played by De Niro. On the other is Sonny, a charismatic local mobster played by Chazz Palminteri, who introduces Calogero to a world his father desperately wants him to avoid.<\/p>\n The film was adapted from Palminteri’s one-man play, with the actor also writing the screenplay (based on his own life story<\/a>) and taking on one of the movie’s most memorable roles. De Niro, meanwhile, pulled double duty both behind and in front of the camera in his feature directorial debut.<\/p>\n That may be part of what makes A Bronx Tale such an interesting entry in De Niro’s filmography. While he had already become one of Hollywood’s most respected actors, the movie gave audiences an opportunity to see what he could do as a director, too.<\/p>\n The 1993 Classic Has a Near-Perfect Rotten Tomatoes Score<\/p>\n Critics clearly appreciated what De Niro brought to the film.<\/p>\n A Bronx Tale currently holds a 97% Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes<\/a>, along with a 92% Popcornmeter score from more than 50,000 audience ratings. The site’s critics consensus praises the movie’s script, cast, and De Niro’s “sensitive work behind the camera.”<\/p>\n The film also remains one of the highest-rated titles in De Niro’s extensive career<\/a>. On Rotten Tomatoes’ ranking of his movies, A Bronx Tale sits among his acclaimed classics with the same 97% score.<\/p>\n This story was originally published by Men’s Journal<\/a> on Aug 29, 2026, where it first appeared in the Entertainment<\/a> section. Add Men’s Journal as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When it comes to Robert De Niro’s greatest movies, the same titles tend to dominate the conversation. Goodfellas,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":332609,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,125116,125118,99109,125115,9,24,63,125117,129,131,130],"class_list":["post-332608","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-bronx-tale","tag-bronx-tale-follows","tag-de-niro","tag-de-niros","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-robert-de-niros","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=332608"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/332608\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/332609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=332608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=332608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=332608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}