A Work of Bloody Genius...One of 2006's Best

Rating: 8/10 (5 November 2006)

For as much as I fancy myself a connoisseur of cinema, I have never been too heavily interested in auteurs like Hitchcock, Kubrick, and Scorsese--granted, they have made some films I've enjoyed, but on the whole, I lack the (seemingly mandatory) obsessive critical enthusiasm for their works overall. But "The Departed" (a surprising remake of a Japanese original) is the type of film that might finally inspire me to peer into Scorsese's extensive backcatalog.
"The Departed," in addition to telling a story that's deceptively simple on first glance, but brilliantly twisted with complication as it progresses, also succeeds in assembling a cast at the tops of their respective games. The film actually deserves its biggest accolade for convincing me (finally) that Leonardo DiCaprio is capable of playing an adult role without a hint of the sappy, sentimental "Titanic" baggage that's long stigmatized him in my eyes (when his undercover agent roughs up two hoods in a convenience store, we buy it completely). Similarly, Matt Damon--who's often seemed like a pretty-boy recycling the same character--has a fine turn as a cop who's corrupt to the bone, whose long-standing relationship with Jack Nicholson's Bostonian mob kingpin only drags him further down. Parallels to "The Score"--the 2001 heist flick that united Robert De Niro, Marlon Brando, and Edward Norton--are not out of place, but "The Departed" is more than a cinematic stunt revolving around a twist ending while the actors show their chops; there is a sincere, wrenching intrigue and dramatic force propelling this ride. Scorsese's implications--as we've seen in "GoodFellas" and "Taxi Driver"--are shattering, and "The Departed" is no exception.
While the plot is intricate and I probably couldn't spoil it even if I tried, it is only a tiny part of the bigger picture. Scorsese's film might be the best fictionalized portrait of corruption among civil servants since 1997's "L.A. Confidential," and the double- and triple-crosses perpetrated by DiCaprio, Damon, and Nicholson interweave beautifully. While the script has its contrivances--a romantic interlude between DiCaprio and Damon's girlfriend (Vera Farmiga)--Scorsese not only makes us feel that something is truly at stake all the time, but is not afraid to align our sympathies with his corrupt characters at any given time. "The Departed"'s constantly spinning moral compass--and the coordinates it settles upon--is one of the film's major attractions, because it keeps predictability at a minimum.
At two and half hours, "The Departed" is a tightly-paced crime thriller that maintains such strong momentum that its minuscule caveats are easily forgivable. In addition to the wonderful interplay between the three leads, Alec Baldwin, Martin Sheen, and Mark Wahlberg also turn in strong supporting work. This is a surprising, enthralling film...one of the year's best.