Departed, The


Rating = A-

Despite its critical success, I was reluctant to see this movie because of its reputation for lots of violence. I finally went to see it so I would have seen all the Oscar nominated movies, and the violence was not particularly off putting to me.

The film is outstandingly created — photography, editing, screen play, and so on. The acting is uniformly strong, with Leonardo DiCaprio impressing me most for being able to hide himself in a role (I had recently seen him in a very different role in Blood Diamond). Come to think of it, Mark Wahlberg was also pretty invisible in his role.

For anyone wondering what the theme of this movie is, the word is “duplicity.” There are more double agents and double crossing than in any other story I have seen or read in a long time.

[2007-02-08]