The Kingdom of Shadows

I wanted so much to believe that The Departed would be a good movie. I like Scorcese. Acclaimed cinematographer Christopher Doyle said that this was a sign of the degeneration of Hollywood (it was like the sixth of his films to be remade), but I believed that maybe, just maybe, Scorcese had a way to move a Buddhist tragedy on to the streets of Boston, and replace the Buddhists with Irish-Americans.

He didn't though. He took a brilliant story and essentially removed everything good from it. The tragic ending was literally replaced by a pun, the gang boss is no longer the complex multi-faceted character he is in Infernal Affairs, and who's good side you really see in Infernal Affairs II(though I must say that Jack Nicholson was fun to watch), instead he's just a guy who likes to kill guys for money. The undercover gangster has the same relationship with his doctor, except with wild sex, and of course, just for the hell of it, they threw in a new character, who's entire purpose is to swear a lot (Mark Wahlberg was nominated for an oscar for the "part").

Ridiculous, its like a satire of all the previous crap remakes Hollywood director's have made of foreign films, except one of the greatest American directors won his only Oscar for this bit of junk.

As much as I never believed I would say this after watching Titanic, but Leonardo DiCaprio is this only real reason to watch this film.