Immensely entertaining

Rating: 8/10 (18 December 2016)

For a director who has built his reputation mostly on Hitchcockian thrillers, Brian De Palma has actually made some of his best (and most famous) films in the gangster genre: "Scarface" (fun on a trashy, guilty-pleasure level), "Carlito's Way" (both visually and emotionally compelling, and perhaps his greatest all-around achievement), and "The Untouchables". This film is shallow in content, but it shows De Palma at the peak of his powers; it has one unforgettable scene after another. Kevin Costner, or maybe Eliot Ness himself, is too stiff and too square, but that doesn't seem to matter, because Sean Connery is so commanding, and because Robert De Niro steals every scene he is in as the flamboyant, sardonic Al Capone (how he never even got an Oscar nomination I'll never understand). The production design is spectacular and Ennio Morriccone's pulsating score is fantastic - among his greatest. This movie is a modern classic. ***1/2 out of 4.