complete disregard for history

Rating: Null/10 (3 June 2003)

how can you make a three hour movie set against the draft riots of 1863--a chaotic few days that pitted new york's irish against new york's blacks--and have only one black character with a speaking role? and a token black character at that!
the screenplay for gangs of new york ignored a huge chunk of the important facts and events of this short period and replaced them with a predictable and uninteresting plot. overacting abounded, especially on the part of daniel day lewis (one of my favorite actors, incidentally) who seemed intent on trying to act like deniro rather than making the character his own. i had to wonder whether he got the part because scorcese wanted deniro, but knew he couldn't quite look irish.
on the plus side, this film has some outstanding cinematography and, as is usually the case with scorcese, is very well crafted, visually speaking. but great visuals can't compensate for poor story and horrific acting.