I'm 47. I first heard about this film from a friend on Facebook and bought the DVD for fifteen bucks at a half-price sale on Criterion titles at a local Barnes & Noble.
You've seen Guy Standeven in something because the man was in everything.

Try Sundowners sometime. It ain't Boston, but it is Mitchum.

I'm 21 and have recently been enlightened to how good an actor Robert Mitchum is. I watched Cape Fear and Night of the Hunter yesterday and wanted to watch a later Mitchum film. This is a thoroughly fantastic film. I love Boston as a setting, it has a rich cinematic history of crime and especially 'rats'. What a gem.

i'm 34, heard of this in the 'killing them sotly' discussion boards.

22, first heard of it about 9 years ago when I saw the trailer on T.V

I'm old. I saw it in the movie theatre when it came out. It was a "whoa," film for me, in part because of the ending, in part because the story was so gritty (and reminded me of the city environment I grew up in) and the actors were so good. I had seen other Mitchum films and thought he was amazing in this one. It was only recently I learned the film was shot in two weeks. You had to have solid, professional, talented actors to pull that off, and it shows.
After this, I followed Richard Jordan's career and was amazed at how different each of the characters he played were from one another over the years. He made me a student of acting - not studying to do it myself, but learning how very talented actors do it. It's made me appreciate this film and others with good acting across the board even more than I already did.

When I was 8 y.o., back in '83, this showed on TV. The channel that aired it ran great '70s movies at 8 P.M. every weeknight, and I had just watched MEAN STREETS that way the night before. THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE is arguably every bit as brilliant (and, frankly, cool) as MEAN STREETS so that was quite a week, awakening me to the fact that movies could be far more than my previous favorites FLASH GORDON and RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK.
Sadly, THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE wouldn't be released on any form of home video for about 30 years, but it's on Blu-Ray now (amazingly) and watching it in that format for the first time last night felt like an impossible dream come true. It really is one of Hollywood's crowning achievements, I say.