The Departed (2006)

Here’s something I wrote in the Long Ago about The Departed, and after re-watching it, it is still how I feel.

With five Oscar nominations heading into tomorrow night’s Academy Awards ceremony, The Departed certainly has developed the reputation of an excellent movie. I was somewhat leery about watching it, worried that it would be another in a long line of Best Picture nominees that were clearly well-made, well-acted movies but were only borderline entertaining. Add in that it was a Martin Scorsese-directed film and I was even more worried that I wouldn’t like it since I’m not the biggest fan of Scorsese’s most popular movies. Thankfully all that worrying was for naught as Scorsese has finally made a movie that is an entertaining – albeit derivative – movie.

Actually, saying that’s derivative is pretty redundant as The Departed is a remake of Infernal Affairs, a Japanese movie released in 2002. Unlike the recent Americanization of Japanese movies (The Ring, The Grudge) it has nothing to do with creepy off-putting children scaring the bejezus out of you. Departed just has Jack Nicholson doing his best Tony Montana-descent into madness performance, with a stellar supporting cast grounding the movie in the wonderful cinematic environment of Boston.

It’s the tale of two cops, with Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon) infilitrating the Boston police force on behalf of crime boss Frank Costello (Nicholson) and the other, Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) going the other way and immersing himself into Costello’s gang. The story takes place over a few years, but thankfully it doesn’t feel like your typical epic Scorsese movie, time is actually heavily compressed in this movie. Sullivan’s on the inside helping Costello keep a half-step ahead of the Boston cops, while Costigan sacrifices his identity for the Special Investigations department, headed up by the fatherly Olvier Queenan (Martin Sheen) and the foul-mouthed Dignam (Mark Wahlberg).

It’s an intriguing story made all the better by the excellent performances of the entire cast. I’ve never been a Mark Wahlberg fan, but I’d definitely be casting my vote for him to win the Best Supporting Actor Oscar this year and those are words that it kills me to type. The most enjoyable performance for me personally was Alec Baldwin, probably his best small part performance since Glengarry Glen Ross. I still have no idea how Matt Damon wasn’t nominated for his role, other than maybe DiCaprio’s performance split the vote but DiCaprio was nominated for his part in Blood Diamond so it beats the hell out of me.

The only two problems I had with the movie are spoilerish in nature, but definitely made the movie feel cartoony with one of the major characters semi-goofy – but heart-wrenching – death as well as the last shot of the movie. Those two sections definitely lend credence to Scorsese personally referring to The Departed as his “B-movie”, but it’s still one of the worthier Best Picture-nominated movies in recent years. It’s entertaining, delivers an engaging story with electric performances and it’s one of those movies that you could see yourself re-watching over and over again.

4.5 / 5

Unauthorized: The Harvey Weinstein Project (2011)

Don’t really have much to say about this documentary.  Directed by Barry Avrich, it tells the story of Miramax co-founder Harvey Weinstein and his meteoric rise in the movie industry.  It doesn’t go into too much depth, just painting Harvey’s character with broad strokes, while also highlighting how much of a Midas touch he seemed to have.  Unquestionably, Harvey changed not just the independent movie industry, but the entire movie industry.  Some may argue for the better, some for the worse.  He basically made an industry out of currying Oscar nominations, and the doc was interesting, though not particularly eye-opening.

3 / 5

Hugo (2011)

Tonight, the 84th Academy Awards will be held, and director Martin Scorsese’s Hugo is one of nine movies vying for the Best Picture Oscar.  With this viewing I’ve seen four of the nine (the other three were The Tree of Life, Moneyball, and The Help) and I swear I will be done with the Oscars forever if Tree of Life wins Best Picture.  I have a serious hate-on for pretentious garbage art-for-the-sake-of-art movies, and I’m going to say that Hugo is the direct antithesis of that hipster twaddle.

I didn’t know much about Hugo going into it, and I think everyone should go into watching it with as little background information as possible.  It makes the story all the more rich, touching and surprising.  I was a bit hesitant when it started, as I generally am at critically acclaimed films, but the wonderful whimsy of the film won me over.  It’s got a bit of an Amélie vibe to it, not just because it takes place in France, but with the wonderful little stories surrounding the supporting cast.

All the acting was top notch, and I could seriously listen to Christopher Lee recite a phone book because he’s just got such a powerfully wise voice.  So much to love about the movie, shameful that it wasn’t a box office success, but I could lay part of the blame for that on it being theatrically released as a 3D movie.  There really was no invasive 3D scenes, so I can’t imagine it gave the movie more depth or anything.  Absolutely wonderful movie, and of the four Best Picture nominated films I’ve seen so far, I would give the Oscar to Hugo.

5 / 5

George Harrison: Living in the Material World (2011)

I’ve been sitting here for the last half hour surfing, reading up on George Harrison, and trying to come up with a hook or something introductory for this review.  I think the fact that thanks to stupid Telus Video On Demand, I haven’t seen the last bit of the movie and don’t have closure on it yet.  I will finish it though, and will edit this review in accordance with any changed feelings (Ed. Note: after watching, nothing changed).

Basically, for years I snobbishly dismissed The Beatles as overrated and hippy music and so on, without really listening to them.  Well, by the time that huge 9/9/09 re-release of The Beatles catalogue came about, I was decidedly amped and jazzed to see what I had been missing.  I ended up buying four of the reissues (Abbey Road, Revolver, Rubber Soul, and Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band) over a period of time, and if I would have continued working at hmv, probably would have ended up owning them all by now.  I also ended up buying several Beatles books and just kind of immersed myself in them for a time and it was lovely.

Through those readings and other media (Nowhere Boy was a fairly decent film, Beatles Rock Band great fun), I had developed this new-found appreciation for them, and the members of the band.  I also came to prefer certain members over the others, and truthfully, John Lennon is the tops, followed by George Harrison, and then well it should be Paul McCartney, but his disturbing physical similarity in his old age to Angela Lansbury… well it IS disturbing.  Then Ringo.  I always respected Harrison’s skills and while I might not be the biggest fan of his spiritual side, I also liked that he seemed to not fully embrace his iconic status and actually distanced himself from it in ways following The Beatles success.

Anyways, Martin Scorsese met with Olivia Harrison, George’s widow, about putting together a documentary on the life of George (it would have been awesome if he called it that).  George Harrison had been collecting archival footage of himself for years to protect his legacy and tell his life story, and Scorsese was given access to it and produced a wonderful sorta documentary / biopic with tremendous music and rarely seen footage and it’s wonderful.  It touches on everything in Harrison’s life that I knew about (will have to wait and see if his “Simpsons” appearance is mentioned in the last bit) and not always in a reverential way.

George Harrison was a human being like all of us (I’m assuming you are, though on the Internet nobody knows if you’re a dog) and he lived a life far bigger and greater than 99% of the entirety of mankind ever will, and ultimately, he appeared to be a pretty humble guy about it.

4.5 / 5