G's Movie Spot "The Departed"
As someone who grew up in the northeast not far from Boston I have spent a lot of time in that city. I am also a huge fan of Martin Scorsese, though his recent films ("Gangs of New York" and "The Aviator") led me to believe he was more interested in courting the Academy for his long overdue directing Oscar than he was in making films on par with sprawling, violent urban masterworks such as "Mean Streets" and "Goodfellas." With "The Departed" Scorsese has once again "found his fastball" to use a baseball term and the film is a visceral, blood soaked thing to behold.
A remake of the 2002 Hong Kong action film "Infernal Affairs" and adapted by Dorchester, Massachusetts born screenwriter William Monahan, "The Departed" quickly establishes the underbelly of Boston as a moral wasteland where law enforcement and criminals operate on both sides of the law. Over news footage of the 1974 anti-busing violence in the city we are introduced to the mobster Frank Costello, played with a menacing gusto by Jack Nicholson. He tells us early on that "I don't want to be a product of my environment...I want my environment to be a product of me." After watching his character's actions in this film you believe him.
In flashback we see Costello take a young neighborhood boy named Colin Sullivan under his wing, giving him work, money and advice, though as we will see later this mentoring is not entirely out of the goodness of his heart. Cut ahead to present day and both Sullivan (Matt Damon) and another young cop named Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) graduate from the police academy and join the force. Here's the catch though: Costigan works for an undercover unit headed by Oliver Queenan (Martin Sheen) and his deputy, Dignam (Mark Wahlberg), and is assigned to infiltrate the mob. More specifically, to help bring down Costello.
Sullivan, on the other hand, is a rising star in the department and soon joins the State Police special investigative unit headed by Ellerby (Alec Baldwin), who chews up the scenery much like he did in "Glengarry Glen Ross." From here we watch Damon's smooth operating character establish himself as Costello's mole at the department while Costigan carefully enters Costello's world and ingratiates himself with the rest of his crew. DiCaprio in particular is very good here playing a vulnerable and tragic character who while he has not made much of himself in life, has a chance to redeem himself and his neighborhood by bringing down the wily, evil mob veteran Costello. He operates on the edges of sanity most of the movie, basically because he knows he could die at any moment if Costello discovers he is a cop.
There is also a love interest, Madolyn (Vera Farmiga), who is a psychiatrist for the department and is involved romantically with both Sullivan and Costigan. She figures prominently in a late plot development and there is also a major plot twist involving the true identity of the Nicholson character. The latter revelation should not come as a major shock, in that Costello is but one of the characters in the story who is not who he appears to be. Unlike many formula cops and robbers stories the characters in "The Departed" are not black and white in terms of good guys and bad guys, just varying shades of gray and moral ambiguity. As Costello says, "...you could become cops or criminals. When you're facing a loaded gun, what's the difference?"
While not quite in the class of Scorsese's finest work such as "Raging Bull" and the films mentioned earlier, "The Departed" is certainly a brilliant return to form for one of our finest directors. Nobody portrays the gritty streets of the city and its morally corrupt denizens (both criminal and cop) quite like him. I should also mention that while it is a bleak and bloody film, there are also many moments of levity. For example, in a scene when Baldwin's character is discussing the advantages of marriage to Sullivan he says "It shows a girl that you have some money and that your dick works."
Though rather profane at times the dialogue is crisp and vivid and the production shows Boston in such a way that only Clint Eastwood's recent "Mystic River" can rival. And there are few directors who can manipulate the perspective of the camera for maximum effect quite like Scorsese. As a fan of movies it is nice to know that he still has it in him. Perhaps the ultimate compliment I can make about "The Departed" is that I was anxious to see it again before it was over.
A remake of the 2002 Hong Kong action film "Infernal Affairs" and adapted by Dorchester, Massachusetts born screenwriter William Monahan, "The Departed" quickly establishes the underbelly of Boston as a moral wasteland where law enforcement and criminals operate on both sides of the law. Over news footage of the 1974 anti-busing violence in the city we are introduced to the mobster Frank Costello, played with a menacing gusto by Jack Nicholson. He tells us early on that "I don't want to be a product of my environment...I want my environment to be a product of me." After watching his character's actions in this film you believe him.
In flashback we see Costello take a young neighborhood boy named Colin Sullivan under his wing, giving him work, money and advice, though as we will see later this mentoring is not entirely out of the goodness of his heart. Cut ahead to present day and both Sullivan (Matt Damon) and another young cop named Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) graduate from the police academy and join the force. Here's the catch though: Costigan works for an undercover unit headed by Oliver Queenan (Martin Sheen) and his deputy, Dignam (Mark Wahlberg), and is assigned to infiltrate the mob. More specifically, to help bring down Costello.
Sullivan, on the other hand, is a rising star in the department and soon joins the State Police special investigative unit headed by Ellerby (Alec Baldwin), who chews up the scenery much like he did in "Glengarry Glen Ross." From here we watch Damon's smooth operating character establish himself as Costello's mole at the department while Costigan carefully enters Costello's world and ingratiates himself with the rest of his crew. DiCaprio in particular is very good here playing a vulnerable and tragic character who while he has not made much of himself in life, has a chance to redeem himself and his neighborhood by bringing down the wily, evil mob veteran Costello. He operates on the edges of sanity most of the movie, basically because he knows he could die at any moment if Costello discovers he is a cop.
There is also a love interest, Madolyn (Vera Farmiga), who is a psychiatrist for the department and is involved romantically with both Sullivan and Costigan. She figures prominently in a late plot development and there is also a major plot twist involving the true identity of the Nicholson character. The latter revelation should not come as a major shock, in that Costello is but one of the characters in the story who is not who he appears to be. Unlike many formula cops and robbers stories the characters in "The Departed" are not black and white in terms of good guys and bad guys, just varying shades of gray and moral ambiguity. As Costello says, "...you could become cops or criminals. When you're facing a loaded gun, what's the difference?"
While not quite in the class of Scorsese's finest work such as "Raging Bull" and the films mentioned earlier, "The Departed" is certainly a brilliant return to form for one of our finest directors. Nobody portrays the gritty streets of the city and its morally corrupt denizens (both criminal and cop) quite like him. I should also mention that while it is a bleak and bloody film, there are also many moments of levity. For example, in a scene when Baldwin's character is discussing the advantages of marriage to Sullivan he says "It shows a girl that you have some money and that your dick works."
Though rather profane at times the dialogue is crisp and vivid and the production shows Boston in such a way that only Clint Eastwood's recent "Mystic River" can rival. And there are few directors who can manipulate the perspective of the camera for maximum effect quite like Scorsese. As a fan of movies it is nice to know that he still has it in him. Perhaps the ultimate compliment I can make about "The Departed" is that I was anxious to see it again before it was over.
posted by Grant @ 6:34 PM
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