A Frustrating Experience

Rating: Null/10 (5 January 2003)

I found watching this movie to be a frustrating experience. On the one hand, it is a visual tour de force--a quality I would expect from a master filmmaker like Scorcese. It is also about an important, yet ugly, part of American history. Scorcese has masterfully recreated an entire era with painstaking detail that is a marvel to watch. The movie also has a great performance by Daniel Day Lewis and some great individual scenes.
On the other hand, however, my enjoyment of it was taken away by the horrendously loud volume level at which the movie was played. The sound system in the theater is probably one of the best in the country, yet, a good sound system does not have to be blasted to be enjoyed. So, watching the movie at home would have been more relaxing--a shame since it was made for the big screen.
I also found the narrative to be a jumbled mess. The characters could not have been more contrived. While The Butcher character was convincing, it could not have been written more theatrically. Instead of a movie that is trying to be everything--a romance, a history lesson, a revenge thriller--I would have enjoyed it much better if the scope would have been narrowed down a bit. I loved the historical aspect of the movie and the battle sequences. Yet, those aspects were undercut by the contrived plot, the ridiculously Hollywood treatment of the love story between De Caprio and Diaz and the familiar revenge theme. This is a shame since Scorcese can very well be a commercial director who doesn't pander to the lowest common denominator--but tragically he does so here.
Overall, the movie did not have the clarity and brilliant execution that Scorcese mastered in just about every other movie he's made, especially those bigger in scope like Goodfellas and Casino. That is too bad.