I mean it depends how you define "bad guys", because in most gangster/crime movies the protagonist is a criminal, but you always have the tendency to root for the protagonist. Which technically makes the cops the bad guys.
You know in the chick flicks where the friend/husband/parent/kid is dying of some oh-so-terrible terminal disease? Yeah. The disease is what I'm pulling for. Just so the movie will end.
you know what, hate to be anal, but carlito wasn't a bad guy, bennie blanco was, and he won. deniro going back for revenge in "Heat" always kills me. frank lucas in American Gangster, that dude is still alive in real life
i saw him as a bad guy trying to change but, ultimately, he failed and his past caught up with him. i can see how you would say he was the good guy...but he never actually made it to the side of the good guys imo. he tried and failed. therefore, i see it as he was a bad guy who lost in the end. even when he was trying to move on, he was still doing bad things up till the very end.
he did make it, he was an ex con running a legit club. yeah, he beat that kid up, but the kid had it coming. but he wasn't selling drugs anymore semantics i guess, its how you view it