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Pirate
07-01-2007, 04:55 PM
I just finished watching this movie and it ended with me shouting at the screen. "WHAT?! WHAT?!" and that's when this movie came crashing down. Directed by Martin Scorsese, staring Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Jack Nicholson, Mark Wahlberg, Martin Sheen and produced by Brad Pitt. This movie should have gone off in a good way. But for me at least, it’s not a movie I would recommend.

The quick and short of the movie is this. Leonardo DiCaprio plays a disgraced ex-cop who's been kicked off the force for being a bastard. He goes to jail and thanks to his crooked family background he's recruited by a mad Irish gangster played by Jack Nicholson. Everything is going to plan as he’s actually an undercover cop and that's where his bosses played by Martin Sheen and Mark Wahlberg want him to be. Bwahahaha, unknown to them the mad Irish gangster has a mole of his own in their very own department who's played by Matt Damon.

So, this should turn out to be a very interesting story. And it is, right up to the part where it's meant to get exciting. I think around that time someone got out the bongs because the movie jumps to wtf mode. Double crosses and awesome violence does break out. But it feels like Monty Pythons salad day's sketch (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Peckinpah's_%22Salad_Days%22). I swear at one stage they just threw a bucket of blood on DiCaprio's pants. But, special effects don't make a movie so I ignored it.

What killed this movie came on during the final moments. I am totally cool with the suspension of belief for movies. Especially when they want to be a little off the wall. But this movie doesn't try to do this. It wants to be gritty like real life. But in the end you're sitting there thinking, there is no way in the world that a cop would do that. Unfortunately I'm going to have to use a spoiler to explain what I mean. Click if you must.

In the ending scenes when the good cop (DiCaprio) goes for his payout and notices the envelope on Matt Damon’s desk, why did he run away? The evidence was there right in front of him and he could have exposed the rat right there. But no, he had to meet him in a deserted building to arrest him and then take him in. Am I meant to believe this? And what was the deal with deleting his file even after a whole entire department had seen him?

It all looks like the makers sat down toward the end of production and over a few cones said "Hey, how can we REALLY mess with their heads?". Freaking stoners.

spurr
07-01-2007, 05:03 PM
I had no major problem with the movie up until the rat ran across the railing at the end. Scorsese's middle name certainly isn't 'subtle'.

Canalien
07-01-2007, 06:27 PM
It's a remake you know...

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0338564/

spurr
07-01-2007, 06:38 PM
It's a remake you know...

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0338564/

Yeah, I grabbed a torrent of Infernal Affairs after going to see The Departed, but I haven't gotten around to watching it yet. Don't tell me that dopey rat scene is in the original too?

Canalien
07-01-2007, 06:40 PM
Haha nooooo...

The ending isn't the same either... well it mostly is... but the Mark Walhlberg bit at the end.. that doesn't happen.

There's two endings for Infernal Affairs actually... not sure which one is available where.

GeeWhiz
07-01-2007, 07:13 PM
I thought The Departed was better than Infernal Affairs. It's defiantly a lot more in your face than IA.

mjolnir
08-01-2007, 01:07 AM
i liked IA more... maybe cause of the subtlety

EDIT: yeah, simple, yet stylish...

hijukal
08-01-2007, 09:18 AM
I prefer Infernal Affairs too. Probably partly because I already knew the story (when watching The Departed) so the "plot twists" didn't surprise me. I also thought The Departed dragged a little bit and was paced too slowly.

chris_F
26-02-2007, 09:54 PM
i really liked this movie

alcor
27-03-2008, 11:59 PM
i really liked this movie

Ya, me too.
I remember being quite impressed with the edgy pace and the plot complexity.

hankster
07-10-2008, 09:58 AM
I remember my wife asking me who was doing what to whom, makes it very difficult to keep track of the plot twists when you have someone asking questions about every plot turn. Also felt this could probably have been a better film without the gore.