The Departed - Infernal Affairs on the Mean Streets of Boston

Martin Scorsese’s “The Departed” will surely provide an entertaining evening and is well worth the price of admission. In the American remake of the 2002 Hong Kong hit crime drama, “Infernal Affairs,” Leonardo DiCaprio plays Billy Costigan, a cop who goes undercover to infiltrate the organization of Boston crime boss, Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson). Matt Damon is Colin Sullivan, DiCaprio’s doppelganger, a Costello mole within the state police. Both Damon and DiCaprio do a fine job. The latter has perhaps truly found his acting stride with consistent performances – some, like in The Aviator, exceptional. Nicholson, however, is good for the sheer fact that he is one of the greatest actors in American cinematic history. There is nothing particularly wowing about his performance, if you hold him against his ability and past performances, but he does an adequate job as the sleazy, controlling, dirty-to-the-bone boss.

Scorsese’s version is not quite as good as the original. Its overall mood is a bit over the top when compared against “Infernal Affairs.” Nicholson perhaps deserves some of the blame here. That being said, William Monahan has done an exquisite job at translating the original from the streets of Hong Kong to the streets of Boston. And Scorsese adds his part. His movies are not typically about the places they inhabit like Los Angeles in Paul Haggis’ “Crash” or New York in any Spike Lee joint. In such films, the city becomes another character in the movie. Locations in Scorsese films, on the other hand, subtly imprint their meaning upon the films in a way that renders them both important and unimportant at the same time. “The Departed” could be set in any city, but then again it could only be set in Boston.

There are some tour-de-force performances in the movie. Mark Wahlberg and Alec Baldwin are tremendous. Though they play cops, they provide the aesthetic of Boston’s Irish streets. They exude swagger, profanity, and toughness overlaid with a sense (below the surface in the case of Wahlberg) of joviality. The other performance that is quite strong is Vera Farmiga’s so long as you forgive the moments where she appears to forget her Bostonian accent. In this testosterone injected film, she does not provide a counterbalancing soft femininity. She does, however, provide an interesting double for DiCaprio’s character in that they are only two in the film that really display any sort of genuine vulnerability. At one point she asks him if his is real. He could easily turn the question around on her. Farmiga’s bold beauty equals her talent and hopefully Hollywood will utilize her more in the years to come.

Large ensemble casts do not always yield strong results. You hope that film is greater than the sum of its part. “The Departed” seems to be just about equal, and it perhaps suffers from having an abundance of talent without an adequate supply of meaty roles.