Good, but not the one

Rating: 5/10 (29 October 2006)

It is difficult to rate this film since parts of it deserve a nine and others a rather sad four.
The film begins quietly, violently and engagingly with De Niro's character, Noodles, taking time out in an opium lounge while heavies are on the search for him. This introductory chapter is a promising piece of cinema with some quite masterfully edited sequences. Aesthetically too, it is masterful and detailed. We are eventually taken on a nostalgic journey back to Noodles' childhood where we are shown the blossoming friendships and criminality that would become his life.
All very nice, all very romantic and visually brilliant. At these early stages in the film, you can see yourself really settling to watching a magnificent epic. But as the film goes on, one can begin to see why this has not become the hardened classic that The Godfather or Goodfellas has. Put simply, there is too much sexuality. From the awkward, fumbling teenager to the grown-up, amoral rapist that Noodles is shown to be, the theme of sexual desire dominates the main body of the film. Indeed, you're never more than fifteen minutes away from a scene where someone is being touched-up, ravaged or slobbered over. Of course, there is nothing wrong with displaying such issues in film, but surely not with such determined frequency as to make it just plain seedy?
The harm that does to the film is two-fold. Firstly it distracts from what could be a beautiful and engaging piece of cinema and secondly it alienates the audience by having no sympathetic character. The Noodles of the 1960s, who we are to follow through the film, is really just an overly-nostalgic, nasty old sex offender.