Totally Underrated!

Rating: 9/10 (27 May 2006)

For me, most of the films in 2002 sucked hard, but this film grasped me completely with a sense of amazement and darkness. i have not seen many Scorsese films, but of the ones I've seen, this is his best! The film is based on the brutal, depressing, and savagery of New York before modernization. It goes back in the 1800s before and during the Civil war. it was the time when gangs ruled the streets, the cops were outnumbered and corrupt, and the majority of people suffered.
The story follows a man named Amsterdam Vallon (Leo DiCaprio), who as a child, in the beginning, witnesses his father, Priet Vallon (Liam Neeson), brutally murdered in a vicious and highly intense brawl of hundreds of men slaughtering one another when the streets and the snow in 1846. He was murdered by a man named Will Cutting, or has he was known as Bill the Bucher, outstandingly played by Daniel Day-lewis.
After sixteen years of the fight in the streets in 1846, Vallon returns as a young man to find the man who killed his father, and seek vengeance. he returns to the New York City which has only grown deeper into a city of sin to find Bill the Butcher. He encounters many obstacles including a young woman, they call a 'turtle dove' (Cameron Diaz who pick-pockets for a living.
He later on finds Bill, and instead of seeking immediate vengeance he develops an unusual father-and-son relationship that makes the film all the powerful. Amsterdam, head-on learns the true nature of New York and how to survive in it with victory. But when Bill learns Amsterdam's intentions, he is banished and therefore he builds an army to take on Bill and his gang of the Five Points to rule New York City. little does everyone know that the war is worsening, and it'll outbreak in the city itself, creating chaos and inevitable destruction.
Winner of ten academy award nominations, the film truly deserved all of them; at least a lot of them. the costumes and set-decorations were authentic and pretty, the cinematography explored the mood of a forgotten city, the music was dark and rather vacant, but above all, the acting by Daniel Day-Lewis was truly Oscar worthy! But this film isn't for everyone. the film is depressing and dark, people, especially woman are portrayed as whores in it, and the violence in this film was deeply brutal. I am not much of a squeamish person, but this film was bad enough to catch me off guard and make me say "oh my God!" literally, there's blood and bodies flowing in the streets in the start and the violent climax.
For me, it was probably the year's best film. Everything was great, besides the gritty violence, but also the pace dragged in places. it not only depicts its gritty and violent nature, but also the power of manipulation. 9/10 It's not the best film I've seen, but the best of 2002.