Evil is in the Eye of the Beholder

Rating: 7/10 (5 December 2003)

Bless Harvey Weinstein's twisted little heart. Once again he has presented us with utterly selfish, dislikable people and produced with them a pretty good story. I felt pretty unmoved by it all, even if I was never bored. This is largely due to Daniel-Day Lewis' phenomenal performance.
I find it mildly amusing that an Italian (Leonard Dicaprio) and a Cuban-Swede (Cameron Diaz) play Irish characters, while Daniel-Day Lewis (an Irishman) plays an Irish-hating American of English descent.
A short synopsis. Daniel-Day Lewis plays the heard of the most powerful gang in the "Five Points" section of New York. He kills Dicaprio father (Liam Neeson) during a gang war between the immigrant Irish and the anti-Irish "nativists." It was a "fair fight," insofar as Lewis and Neeson had met a formal challenge and Lewis honors Neeson. Nonetheless, 16 years later, Dicaprio plots revenge, becoming Lewis's Lieutenant with a secret plan to kill him during the annual celebration Lewis throws to celebrate and honor Neeson, "The last interesting man I killed."
There are really no "good guys" in this movie, but I found myself more in sympathy with Lewis than Dicaprio. Then, as today, American citizens are victimized by greedy politicians and businessmen capitalizing on immigration. This time, of course, it is illegal immigrants. However, who is to say that the "legal" immigration of the period wasn't excessive? Certainly, the movie portrays the Irish immigrants as almost entirely composed of thieves, whores and drunkards.
While Lewis can be generous and, even, somewhat forgiving, Dicaprio possesses neither of these qualities. With the assistance of "Boss Tweed" (Jim Broadbent, in another great performance), Dicaprio and his Irish supporters steal a sheriff's election, precipitating much of the climatic violence. Diaz plays a whore and a thief, though she is certainly more unselfish than Dicaprio.
Let me compare this, for a moment, with a much better movie, "Unforgiven". The moral ambiguity in "Unforgiven" is clear, in that there are no "good guys;" but, Eastwood's character is avenging two miscarriages of justice, the whore's mutilation and the murder of his friend under the guise of "justice". "Gangs of New York," one wonders how New York survived such such predatory and self-destructive people.
The movie boasts a good score, excellent period production values and Scorsese's usual masterful camera movements. Nonetheless, only the historical context and Day-Lewis' remarkable performance kept me involved enough to finish "Gangs of New York."