BY BOB HOLT

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

The story of “Iceman” Richard Kulinski has New Jersey running through it.

Kulinski, a Mafia hit man who was based in Bergen County, is the subject of “The Iceman,” a movie starring Michael Shannon that was released Friday.

New Jersey is heavily involved in the film. NorthJersey.com reports that Kulinski, who was convicted of four murders, lived with his family in Dumont, and died in State Prison in Trenton in 2006. Former Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agent Dominick Polifrone from Hackensack helped to bring Kulinski to justice.

Director Ariel Vromen wanted to make the movie in New Jersey, but it was filmed in Louisiana for financial reasons.

Shannon said he played Kulinski because he wanted to understand how somebody could be both a killer and a family man. “It seems like such a contradiction and yet he was very successful for a very long time at it,” Shannon said, according to AM New York. I think his family, no matter how devastated they were by the revelation that he was a killer, they very genuinely loved him and continue to love him.”

New Milford Patch reports that Kuklinski claimed to have killed more than 100 people during the 1970s and 80s. He got the nickname “The Iceman” for allegedly freezing victims to delay an investigation.

Polifrone worked with the New Jersey State Police and the state Attorney General’s Office to investigate Kulinski. Posing as an arms supplier, Polifrone recorded conversations he had with Kulinski with a hidden tape recorder.

The movie jarred memories for Polifrone. “All of a sudden I remember different things where he was telling me about these different murders,” Polifrone said, according to NorthJersey.com. “I look back at this movie, and I’m saying to myself, ‘What the hell was I thinking?”

Kulinski was finally arrested in 1986.