The Departed

IMDB

If you don’t want to read the voluminous post that is about to come, then I can summarize this for you very easily – this is a damn good film. If you want to find out why I think so, move on….

First of all, the cast is reason enough to sign up for this, even on a crowded Friday night where you have to come back for the 10:15 because the 7:50 sold out. When I saw a preview for this film, the number of big hitters up on the screen made things look very interesting. It doesn’t take much to make me want to watch a film (hey, I write a review blog, for crying out loud) so the following made it easy:

• Martin Scorsese – Does this guy need describing? Ever see Casino?
• Leonardo DiCaprio – I know that a lot of people write this guy off as a pretty boy, but I think that saying that is weak. Romeo + Juliet was extremely well done, and Gangs of New York was also a great vehicle for him. He played his part well in Titanic, too. In this film he plays the fairly common role for him of the troubled youngster making good in a hurtful world, and it was not a stretch for him at all.
• Matt Damon – Another guy who sometimes does not get appropriate credit because of the attention he gets from the ladies. Good Will Hunting was brilliant, and The Bourne Identity films are something to behold. He was also fantastic in Syriana, which is under-appreciated by a lot of people. This is one of the few times where he plays a bad guy, which keeps him along the road he started down with Syriana of playing more complex roles. He was very spooky in this film, and I liked it.
• Jack Nicholson – The legend himself. To be honest, I have not seen a lot of him lately because he has been doing the kinds of films that I don’t get attracted to. But in films like A Few Good Men, he has made a very good showing of being an old bastard, and doing very well at it. He seems like a very good pick to play the gangster boss that he plays, and seems to relish in the role.
• Mark Wahlberg – Yet another guy who gets knocked for his female appeal, but is actually a great actor. I first saw him in Boogie Nights, but he really became a made man in my eyes in The Big Hit. And then there was Three Kings, The Perfect Storm, The Italian Job, Four Brothers, and now this. He was very well cast as a rough sergeant in charge of the undercover cops. Mark has a great style and presence on the screen in this film.
• Martin Sheen – An old legend, the father of the Men at Work boys, this guy has the biggest scroll bar in IMDB of them all. Doesn’t look like a guy to do a lemon, either, and he certainly did well here playing the old cop in charge of the undercover guys, barely reining Wahlberg’s character in.
• Alec Baldwin – This guy has started to play a recurring role as a real hard ass, but it is a very entertaining role. His portrayal of a rough boss cop talking shit to any and all that he sees is fantastic.

With a cast like this all that was needed was a decent story and script – there was nothing that could be blamed on the people here. The story is about a couple of guys in the academy. One of them (Collin Sullivan, played by Damon) is an inside man for a gangster (Frank Costello, played by Nicholson). The other (Billy Costigan, played by DiCaprio) becomes a deep undercover operative who starts working for Costello’s crew in an effort to bring him down.

Since Costello suspects that he has a rat, and the police suspect that Costello has a man on the inside, Sullivan and Costigan spend the film looking for each other and trying to avoid each other at the same time. Considering the subject matter of cops and undercover cops and gangsters, there are virtually no cliches in the film to speak of. The temptation to do the following was resisted:

• Have extensive arguments about whether a wire is to be worn or not.
• Have the undercover guy fall in love with a criminal girl while undercover, and then have to reveal that he is a cop.
• Arguments between the captain and the untraditional guy ending in a badge + gun on a table.
• Cops being killed right before they are about to retire (Mendoza!!!!).

The setting for the film was Boston, and having only spent 5 days there in my life, it was tough to fault it. The film spends considerable time talking about South Boston, and some of the actors have some slightly overdone accents, but there is definitely an attempt to make it immersive. The cinematography is not outstanding to the point of needing much mention, however, which is fine because this is Drama and it is not really needed.

One of the best things about the movie has to be the script. The banter between some of the characters is priceless, and the shit that they talk is very funny at times, but not in a way that detracts from the seriousness of the film. Where there is shooting or fighting it is brief, which lends some realism. Most fights are over very quickly, which tends to be how things pan out in reality.

The ending is somewhat novel, if a little different to what I expected. I think that maybe 10 minutes could be shaved off the film (it felt a smidgen long) but I would hesitate to pick out what could be removed. Overall, though, this is one of the best cop movies that I have seen for a very long time. There is nothing complex about how this is – the Director, the cast, the script are all very good and that is a simple formula for making celluloid magic.