The Departed : The very first Review
Holy Shit! Was browsing AICN and found that they have a “secret” review sent by a “secret” reader for Martin Scorcese’s much awaited – The Departed. For those who came in late, The Departed is adapted (officially no Bollywood Ctrl C/Ctrl V here) from the Hong Kong hit – Infernal Affairs, which was a fairly decent movie Rated B+ in oz’s books.
The crew of “The Departed” looks like a Who’s Who Powerlist of Hollywood what with names like Martin Scorcese, Jack Nicholson, Matt Damon, Leonardo DiCaprio… ufff!
So without any delay here’s what moviechick33 wrote on AICN
Here you go! Please don’t use my real name. You can use moviechick33. I know, very original.
Hi all. On Wednesday, August 23, I attended a private screening of the new Martin Scorsese film THE DEPARTED in Edgewater, NJ. The Movie View people explained that this was still a rough cut and will likely be rated R for strong violence, language and sexuality. It?s Scorsese, duh!
They gave us the following synopsis: The film is set in South Boston, where the state police force is waging war on organized crime. Young undercover cop Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) is assigned to infiltrate the gang run by boss Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson). While Billy is quickly gaining Costello?s confidence, Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon), a hardened young criminal who has infiltrated the police department as an informer for the gang, is rising to a position of power. Colin tries to marry up by getting involved with a police psychiatrist. As the situation reaches its dramatic climax, all three men must race to protect their fate and the lives of everyone around them. The movie also stars Mark Wahlberg, Alec Baldwin, Martin Sheen, Anthony Anderson and Vera Farmiga.
Having absolutely hated GANGS OF NEW YORK (shot cool and all, but was quite literary my #1 worse film of 2002) and found THE AVIATOR pretty damn boring, I didn?t have high hopes going in. Boy was I pleasantly surprised. I?m glad Scorsese went back to what he does best: dirty, bloody mob-crime stories.
I would say the first half hour was a blur. They cut from scene to scene, jumping all over the place – obviously to set up the character and story. It was at this point that I was a little nervous because nothing jelled yet; every character came off bland and cartoonish and to me, a Boston native, the accents were laughable. Why oh why do actors attempt Boston accents? BLOWN AWAY or THIRTEEN DAYS anyone? Only Matt Damon and Mark Wahlberg were excused because they actually grew up in the Southie area. To me it was just distracting.
Once the meat of the story got going, it was very intense and well acted. Baldwin and Wahlberg stole their scenes and provided much needed humor to cut the tension. Nicholson played Nicholson he didn?t do anything that you haven?t already seen in another movie of his. He played nuts, looked crusty, flailed his arms around doing that Joker dance of his, and basically looked like he was having a ball. It took a while for DiCaprio to settle into his character but when he did he was probably the best of the three top-billed actors. Damon was good in the way he always is playing subtle and walking the line.
Before I talk about the best part of the movie, I have to mention the worst: Vera Farmiga. To me, she is best known for playing one of the leads in the short-lived 2004 television series TOUCHING EVIL. Farmiga played Madeleine, the psychiatrist who had connections to both Damon and DiCaprio?s characters. I?m not sure if it was the way her character was written, but I thought she wasn?t up to the acting chops of her peers. Without giving anything away, the romance plot made little sense and really served no purpose other than getting her on a bed in her underwear. Okay, for some of you, the half naked girl thing probably worked fine. There was no chemistry with either Damon or DiCaprio. In a movie that was pretty strong, this was by far the weakest plot point.
Just a few other tiny things that bugged me: it is trademark Scorsese but the gratuitous use of offensive racial terms in the beginning of the movie added little to the character development; there were a few too many extraneous characters that could have been edited out; and it was hard to distinguish how much time passed and what events were occurring contemporaneously.
THE DEPARTED was about 2 hours, 15 minutes long felt longer, but most Scorsese movies do it is just the pacing. Didn?t bother me because the last 20 minutes were fantastic and I would recommend the movie based on just the end. A bunch of ?shocker? moments, that I wouldn?t call twists, but I didn?t see them coming and I, 90% of the time, see what?s coming.
So yeah, I rated it Very Good on the score sheet, not Excellent, but Very Good. I was also part of the focus group after the movie. I would say that 95% of the 25 of us really liked it. Not one person mentioned that this was a remake of the Hong Kong movie INFERNAL AFFAIRS though. The biggest complaint from most people was that the film didn?t explain certain things: What was in the box? What was in the envelope? How did a character find out something in the end? For me, none of that mattered, I felt it was all inferred and I don?t think it is always necessary to spell out everything for a moviegoer. It is like the suitcase in PULP FICTION. Do you really need to know what was in it? Isn?t it more fun guessing? Explaining every plot point dumbs down a movie and for THE DEPARTED, I thought the mystery worked.
-Moviechick33
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Good one! Moviechick33 is one lucky chick! Just want to share one tiny detail: The box metaphor used in Pulp Fiction (Avery & QT) [and apparently in Departed, per MC33] was also used by Mamet (David Fucking Mamet) in Ronin.
Apologies for crossposting guys, but here’s the post re Guillermo del Toro’s “Pan’s Labarynth” on AICN: http://www.aintitcool.com/node/30377
I saw ” The Departed” The very first day here In USA. Its the first english movie that i was waiting to see it on first day and probably first show in the evening. I have never felt so excited in my life apart from Maniratnam and Aamir Khan (post sarfarosh) movies. I think Mardy (M scorcese) is THE DIRECTOR coz i think he has his basics clear. I have seen all of his movies in past 3months right from Taxidriver to Aviator and I was so impressed by the way he evolved as the director for past 25yrs or so.
Now let me tell you about “The departed” i think its been around 15 days since i have seen this movie and I writing this review based on what eva is left in my mind. The movie starts of showing growth of 3 principle characters Jack Nicholson(Mafia in boston), Matt Damon(Corrupted COP) and DeCaprio(Honest COP). for first 15-20 minutes you will how Matt Damon will meet Jack how does their relationship evolve. Damon and DeCaprio will pass out from police academy and both will qualify for Detective at the time of their interivew the story takes a twist Decaprio will be assigned as undercover cop and he will join Jack’s mafia gang and at the same time MattDamon will lead the detectives of boston police to find Jack.
From now on story takes some twists and turns, In the process the chief of boston police gets killed by jacks gang.
I think one has to watch the movie to findout how story unfolds in last 20-30 minutes.
I feel movie started off very good but after 45 min you will be bored for another 20-30 min but last 30 minutes of it is just crazy. Mardy has once again proved that he is the best to capture shooting scenes. As i like lot of blood to spilled on the floor i was satisfied very much.
I think most of the people will like the movie but being die hard fan of Mardy I loved it.
I think Decaprio and Jack were just brilliant in this movie Matt Damon was good and background score is diff and i liked it.
Overall My Rating for this movie will be 7.5/10
@ Varun You In USA? Ohh wow… kahan pei? Accha Listen.. Dude i sent you a mail sometime back and i need to get in touch with you…PLsssss reply back
P.S: this is not a Private message board, but i just had to holla at him.
I’m from Oklahoma and I dont remember any email from you If you like to email me @ varunscool@hotmail.com
I think i got the wrong Varun here..my bad
No Prob brother
Finally the movie released here in India yesterday, and I caught the first show.
It will take me some time and one more viewing perhaps to absorb the film, it is hard to place it along Goodfellas as of now. But the film did something to me which Gangs or Aviator didn’t do.
It left that lingering feeling after it was over, the kinds you get after watching films that you never forget.
It is certainly the best Hollywood film to come out in recent times.
More than anything, what works in its favor is the toned-down, low on gloss and elemental Scorsese.
I even wrote a little somethin on it!
Guts & Balls
He has Balls with a capital ‘B’
He has Guts with a capital ‘G’
His name is Martin Scorsese
—-APPLAUSE——-
Here’s a link to the script – all youse.
http://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/departed.pdf
Tushar – good lines. Reads like the hero’s self intro lines – before the first fight – Rishtey mein hum sab ke baap hote hain – naam hain Shehenshah!!
i quite agree with the moviechick.. IMO the shrink angle was the weakest point in the plot..otherwise it worked well for me..gr8 movie!
someone have the script they can email me? I have an early draft, Im looking for the one that was on the dailyscript before it was pulled (searchable pdf)
email: sienkiewicz@gmail.com
Thanks
hi all,
if you remove martin scorsese name from it ,i am sure reviews will change dramatically.What ws that punchline”i dont want to be a product…” for?it seems the original message was lost in next few minutes only.Other than very good piece of acting from Dicaprio,you dnt see any M.S stuff.i remember Nihlani’s Drohkaal which ws a much more powerful statement on the same punchline..