Plot: Calogero Anello is a nine-year-old child living in the Bronx - notorious for gangster bars, racist people and an aggressive nature. Calogero witnesses a shooting in the street involving local big shot gangster, Sonny, but refuses to betray him to the police. Sonny grows fond of the boy and begins to teach him how things are conducted on the streets. Calogero's father is a working man who wants his child to grow up and make his money honestly and does not want him to mix with Sonny. Despite his father's disapproval, for eight years Calogero continues to see Sonny and receives a 'street' education from him. Despite being a gangster, Sonny loves Calogero and teaches him that being a gangster is too risky and dangerous. However, Calogero misinterprets Sonny's message and still gets involved with his friends in racism and fights. Things get worse when he falls in love with a black girl. This story is about a Bronx where a child grows up with two educations, one from school and one from the street. As the child grows closer to a gangster, he begins to grow away from his family.
Alternative Plot: As he grows into a teenager on the streets of the Bronx in the socially turbulent 1960s, Calogero (Lillo Brancato) gets taken under the wing of neighborhood mobster Sonny (Chazz Palminteri). Sonny initiates the boy into the ways of gangland life, in direct conflict with his straight-arrow bus driver father (Robert De Niro). But when Calogero falls for his African-American classmate, Jane (Taral Hicks), the repercussions threaten the entire neighborhood.
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