"You know, Southie kids, we went straight from playing cops and robbers on the playground to doing it for real in the streets".

Rating: 8/10 (29 September 2016)

I watched this movie literally minutes after setting down the book 'Whitey Bulger' (Copyright 2013 by Globe Newspaper Company, Inc.), written by Boston Globe reporters Kevin Cullen and Shelley Murphy. Neither one is credited in the source material for the film, either as writers or for screenplay; that goes to Dick Lehr and Gerard O'Neill for another book. If I didn't know that it wouldn't have made any difference, since a lot of what appears in the movie was touched on in the one I read with only the very slightest of variations which I'll get to.
The most amazing thing about this story is that it's actually true, based on the life of Boston mobster James 'Whitey' Bulger. So when you see the local FBI office making a deal with Bulger (Johnny Depp) to provide information on the rival Mafia gang, one can hardly believe it since it seems like it comes from someone's delusional imagination. But this was at a time in the early Seventies when the Bureau's mandate was to get the goods on the Italian Cosa Nostra virtually to the exclusion of any other priorities.
What may be a little difficult to follow are all various scenarios and vignettes that don't seem to be connected in any way, like the death of Bulger's son, his involvement with World Jai Alai, the murder of Stephen Flemmi's (Rory Cochrane) girlfriend's daughter, and the gun running operation to the IRA. The book provides all the background and nuance to these events in a way that better illustrates the relationships of the participating players. What's almost absent in the film is any actual involvement with the Jerry Angiulo crime family, although it's touched on here and there.
Realizing that the film comes in at two hours to begin with, the major missing element to the Bulger story was his relationship with the two main women in his life. For a good part of his mobster life, Bulger lived with a woman by the name of Theresa Stanley and her family during the day, and then reverted to his alternate lover Cathy Grieg by night. When it eventually became necessary for Bulger to make himself scarce, he went on the run, first with Stanley, but she could only take it for a couple of months. Whitey returned her to Boston after receiving word of partner Flemmi's arrest. With Cathy Grieg, he remained a fugitive for the next sixteen years.
Bulger's apprehension and arrest to close out the film story was attributed to an anonymous tip, however his actual undoing came as the result of a chance encounter Cathy Grieg had with a fellow dog lover while living in Santa Monica. After that friend moved to Iceland, she saw a television account of Bulger and Grieg, recognizing them immediately. Calling the Boston office of the FBI, a new detail on the case contacted the Los Angeles FBI and the apprehension was made rather quickly and without incident.
As far as gangster movies goes, I thought this one was adequate, helped by the perspective I had from reading 'Whitey Bulger'. It doesn't stack up to films like "The Godfather", "Scarface" or "Miller's Crossing" in terms of excitement or intensity, but then again, this was a true story. A note of thanks to IMDb reviewer 'TxMike' for an explanation on the title of the movie, as I was wondering about that myself and couldn't figure out what connection it had to Whitey Bulger or the Winter Hill Gang, but now I know.