When Daniel Day-Lewis gives a bad performance, you know you're in trouble

Rating: 4/10 (20 July 2006)

The Plot - sort of a West Side Story for the post-Colonial age, with Irish immigrants fighting their "native" oppressors. One of the ringleaders of the "natives" is a ferocious, cantankerous, and most likely insane fellow with a glass eye known as William Cutting, AKA: Bill the Butcher (Daniel Day-Lewis); based on a real person. Bill the Butcher kills the leader of an Irish gang called the Dead Rabbits, that leader being "Priest" Vallon (Liam Neeson) during a gang fight. Years later, Vallon's son, Amsterdam (Leonardo Dicaprio) having achieved adulthood, seeks revenge on Bill (who hasn't aged a day), but first infiltrates Bill's gang and becomes a kind of student to him. Later Amsterdam gets involved with pretty thief Jenny (Cameron Diaz), who has a sordid, seedy past with Bill the Butcher. Love, lust, betrayal, the Draft Riots, chaos and mayhem ensues.
In the end, the film is a mess. An ambitious, beautiful looking mess, but a mess all the same. Despite it's lofty dreams of examining the oft forgotten trouble of the time period and having the much beloved director Martin Scorsese at the helm, the film never really becomes cohesive and the characters are for the most part not all that likable or interesting. Perhaps the biggest disappointment is Daniel Day-Lewis, one of the most charismatic and engaging actors of his generation, but one whose film output is so sporadic that he was missing in action for five years before making this, his much hailed return to the cinematic screen. And, unfortunately, Day-Lewis gives a Razzie worthy performance. Whatever skill or passion or dedication he put into the character just doesn't transfer well to the screen. In the end, Day-Lewis, complete with an irritating accent, comes across as being little more than a one-note cartoon villain. I can only assume that the character looked better on paper. The film also wastes Liam Neeson, who appears only too briefly as the stalwart Irishman whose courage inspired all and impressed Bill. Perhaps a more engaging story could have been found in focusing on the conflict between Day-Lewis and Neeson, but alas, this was not to be.