Hopeless

Rating: 1/10 (6 January 2003)

Martin Scorsese once again does a period piece set in New York in 1862. Why? Wasn't "Age of Innocence" bad enough?
Story is supposed to be about a boy (Leonardo DiCaprio) out to avenge his fathers (Liam Neeson) death at the hands of William Cutting (Daniel Day-Lewis). But the screenwriters try to shoehorn in every single event happening in NYC in the 1860s. There's abolition, the Union Army, the Draft Riots, bigotry, murder, immigrants, racism, robbery etc etc etc. It's too much for one movie to hold and most of it has precious little to do with the main story. More often than not I was confused and bored by these constant detours from the story. I twice considered walking out because I was so bored--a few people did leave.
Also the dialogue in this movie is horrible--when you can understand it. Day-Lewis adopts a very strange annoying accent and DiCaprio unwisely tries to do an Irish accent (which comes and goes throughout the movie). Cameron Diaz as con artist Jenny Everdeane wisely doesn't try. As for the acting....weellllllll...what can you say about a movie where DiCaprio gives the best performance? He's lousy but he's better than anybody else. Day-Lewis growls, yells and chews the scenery to a ridiculous degree and Diaz has the hopeless bad girl with the heart of gold role--she deserves much better than this.
The movie is hellishly long at 2 hours and 45 minutes. It looks great but it's dull, badly written, badly acted, surprisingly badly directed and totally unfocused.
A real disappointment. Probably Scorsese's worst film to date. One positive thing--if you're an insomniac this will put you to sleep!!!