Good movie

Rating: 8/10 (8 October 2006)

For every HK people, The Departed must be one of the movies that most yearned for. But many HKers find it disappointing as Departed did not bring out the marrow of the original -- both moles living in "wo jin dao" (the Chinese name of the original, meaning the lowest level of the hell) -- and lost the tension between the FOUR leading roles -- Ming (Billy in Departed), Yan (Colin), Sam (Costello) and Wong (missing character, the role is functionally shared by Martin Sheen and Mark Walhberg). Without these two elements, Departed, from my point of view, is only a good, entertaining, well performed movie.
The Departed has shortened the time that Billy was put in the gang (nine years in the original to one), weakening the complexity of Billy's situation that he may not be able to turn back to be a good guy. And it makes Colin's fast lifting career less logical.
After erasing Wong's role, the film just losses the "cat" in the "cat catching mice" game, leaving Costello an ordinary but crazy gang boss, while in the original, the interaction between Sam (Costello's role) and Wong is a very interesting line.
One more thing, about the micro chip scene, it just doesn't make sense that the Chinese speak Cantonese for such a deal by PRC agency. They should speak Mandarin!!! Cantonese is only used in Hong Kong, and part of the Guangdong Province!!! And if they really want to use Cantonese, please find somebodies that speak REAL Cantonese!!! What they are speaking is like English-accent Cantonese and every people in the cinema just cannot stop laughing at their tone. And the script is wrong in meaning too, such that "fong de cheong" (meaning put down the guns) was read as "fong cheong" (don't have such phase in Cantonese, but somewhat implies the meaning of "to fire").