A Great Career Comes Full Circle

Rating: 7/10 (23 December 2002)

What I have noticed since this film has been released is that people either think that this is a great film or they think it is a mess. Personally i am a huge Martin Scorsese fan and i have seen every movie he has made and am fully aware that he is not perfect (kundun). But this is a great film. The movie is a revenge story set in the backdrop of 19th century New York. I read the book Gangs of New York and i think that the creative team of dante ferretti and sandy powell really helped recreate 19th century New York. The performances in the film were good all around. The Cameron Diaz storyline took away from the revenge between Amsterdam (dicaprio) and bill the butcher (day-lewis). Daniel Day-Lewis gives the best performance on screen since kevin spacey in american beauty. It is hard to imagine that willem dafoe and robert de niro, as great as they are, were considered to this role so perfect for day-lewis. This is the greatest historical epic that i have seen and in my opinion it is better than the recent gladiator and braveheart. We all know that scorsese will win his oscar this year because they now give it as a career achievement but the question is how many more will it win? I give this film my highest rating 10/10 and i think everyone, especially new yorkers, should see this movie.