The Departed

Rating: R16 – Contains Graphic Violence & Offensive Language.
Duration: 145 mins.
Genre: Suspense & Thriller, Crime.
Actors: Anthony Anderson, Ray Winstone, Jack Nicholson, Alec Baldwin, Matt Damon, Martin Sheen, Vera Farmiga, Mark Wahlberg, Leonardo DiCaprio, Kevin Corrigan.
Director: Martin Scorsese.
Release Date: Available Now.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not looking for sympathy here, I just want you to know that my views may be influenced by the quality of the DVD screener I was sent for review.

Most reviews I do are done on the finished product, a fully packaged DVD exactly the same as you would by from a retail shop.

Occasionally I’ll get sent screeners – advance copies of the DVD that only differ in the actual packaging.

Then there’s the poor quality screeners.

They come with a full screen presentation – so you miss half the action, the details, the subtlety. They also come with a big time-code running for the duration of the movie, along with the words ‘property of so and so, etc’ popping up at regular intervals.

What made The Departed particularly bad was it had all the features of a poor quality screener, and the actual video and in places, sound quality was worse than that of a bad pirated DVD.

Not the best start for a move hyped as it was, and the proud owner of four Oscars. You’d think WarnerBros would want to only have the best quality for reviewers on this one.

Never mind. I’ll say from the start, that despite everything that I’ve just moaned and complained about, The Departed was still very watch able.

Surprisingly so for a re-make.

And a re-make of one of my favourite Hong Kong action movies, Infernal Affairs.

So the basic plot; The mean streets of South Boston are owned by the Mob, and the police are all but powerless to control them. They decide to set up a special unit to combat the Mob, and a secret team to place a mole at the very heart of the Mob.

Of course, the Mob being the Mob, wants to stay one step ahead of the police, so send one of the own men into deep cover to infiltrate the police force.

Both sides realising after a while that they are both compromised, and thus begins the game of cat and mouse as each mole is tasked to find the other out.

If you’ve seen Infernal Affairs, you pretty much know what’s going to happen.

Scorsese does a fine job of bringing all the elements together, and doesn’t shy away from the graphic nature of the storyline, this may be too much for some to stomach, but in reality it’s the only way to tell such a story without losing credibility – or the audiences attention.

An interesting thing with The Departed is the number of a-Class actors that take part; Ray Winstone, Jack Nicholson, Alec Baldwin, Matt Damon, Martin Sheen, Mark Wahlberg and Leonardo DiCaprio.

Wow.

But this is also part of the movies weakness. Well, not the actors them selves, they all do a fine job in their respective roles, but the sheer number of important players doesn’t give Scorsese enough time to aptly do each character justice, rather the main focus is just on the three key players, Jack, Matt and Leo.

So what do the mean streets of South Boston offer us in the form of a movie.

For one, they offer a very dark backdrop for an equally dark look at corruption.

Corruption permeates this movie in an insidious way. The undercover cop soon realises that he is going to have to compromise his moral standpoint, over and over again, until he starts to become the very thing he is fighting against.

Secretes and personal vendettas become the driving force behind many of the characters ultimate choices, and it seems that all notion of hope has escaped from this dark back alley of society.

These are all fine ingredients for a decent crime movie, add to that a plot that twists and turns, keeping the story on a knife edge and the viewers nerves in tatters. Scorsese does a brilliant job at translating what would have to be one of the best re-made movies I have seen in a while.

Food for thought:
Does the end always justify the means?

Rent or Buy?
Buy it, it’s an instant classic!