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film: The Departed
director: Martin Scorsese
cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon
Warner Brothers / 2006 / 151 min
score: 90
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by Tim Mathiesen
Winner: Best Picture / Best Director
This is one of those films where everything seems perfect.
The acting, screenplay, cinematography, and directing, is all top-notch quality.
It's incredibly fun, intelligent, creative and original enough to be unpredictable.
This film is great on all levels.
I was worried it would turn out to be one of those films that's only enjoyed once,
but when "The Departed" was released on DVD I watched it again and enjoyed it just as much as the first time.
This is a story about more than just cops vs. the mafia, "The Departed" is about
honor, integrity, truth and justice. It's about making a choice when every option is immoral.
It's about finding the truth when everything around you is built on lies. It's about the choice between saving yourself
or saving the little bit of good that's left.
I despise remakes. Especially when the original was made within the same decade.
Although the script for "The Departed" is adapted from the popular Hong Kong film,
"Infernal Affairs" (Miramax / 2002), Scorsese makes it his own, so that it doesn't really matter where it came from.
This film will stand on it's own as one of Scorsese's best-loved films. It may not be his most artistically challenging,
but it's one of his overall best.
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