THE DEPARTED and INFERNAL AFFAIRS ***1/2 (out of ****)
INFERNAL AFFAIRS (MOU GAAN DOU) Starring Tony Leung, Andy Lau, Anthony Wong, Eric Tsang, and Kelly Chen Directed by Wai Keung Lau and Siu Fai Mak & written by Alex Chong and Siu Fai Mak 2002 101 min R		THE DEPARTED Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Jack Nicholson, Marky Mark Wahlberg, Martin Sheen, Vera Farmiga, Ray Winstone, and Alec Baldwin Directed by Martin Scorsese & written by William Monahan, from the screenplay “Infernal Affairs” by Siu Fai Mak and Felix Chong 2006 151 min R
IMDb sez:  “Two men from opposite sides of the law are undercover within the [police and the mob], but violence and bloodshed boil when discoveries are made, and the moles are dispatched to find out their enemy’s identities.”  “Infernal Affairs” tells this tale in Hong Kong, while the American remake “The Departed” moves to the Boston Irish. The great accomplishment of “Infernal Affairs” is to take a premise that could so easily be preposterous and turn into a genuinely moving tragedy.  There are three great scenes.  The undercover cop hides in an alley to salute a passing cop funeral.  He confesses to his shrink that he’s a cop and a look of open-faced joy crosses his face to have said so.  And when he thinks it’s all over and sits down, worn, in the police station.  All three scenes involve the great and dreamy Chinaman Tony Leung (“Hero,” “2046,” “Chungking Express”) in top form.  Andy Lau (“House of Flying Daggers”) is his counterpoint. “How many millions died so that Caesar could become Caesar?” says the villainous lead gangster.  But he’s wrong if he thinks he’s Caesar.  I thought for sure this was why Scorsese wanted to remake it — the idea of good men laying down their lives to give a sinner another chance is very much his cup of tea.  (At least that’s what I thought before I saw “The Departed.”)  Supernatural elements aside, sometimes little separates Buddhism and Catholicism. Praise is being heaped on “The Departed” from many corners, for two reasons:  first, the movie is a tremendous entertainment, and second, more cynically, a lot of people really don’t like it when artists try new things.  They like Martin Scorsese being “that guy who makes contemporary urban dramas about men hitting each other.”  And, yes, his “canonical four,” you could say,  all fit this description (“Goodfellas,” “Taxi Driver,” “Raging Bull,” “Mean Streets”). But “The Departed” is getting a lot of its praise from quarters that probably had mixed feelings about “The Last Temptation of Christ” and “The Age of Innocence” and certainly didn’t like “Gangs of New York” and “The Aviator.”  How dare Scorsese get out of his box and complicate our understanding of him?!  So, for all its violence, “The Departed” is a “safer” movie artistically for Scorsese than his previous two outings.  While exciting and beautifully cut, “The Departed” also lacks the visual flair of “Gangs” and “Aviator.”  “The Departed’s” poster is right – this movie is mostly about the scowling faces of men talking. Still, like I said, “The Departed” is a lot of fun, and chiefly because (I won’t lie) of hearing guys swear at each other in Boston accents.  I could listen to Alec Baldwin and Marky Mark trade flat-faced curse words all day.  Players in “The Departed” never stop accusing each other of being “facking homos.”  The movie is a crackling entertainment in that its plot is twisty and engaging and there are plenty of macabre laughs along the way.  It’s interesting how it and “Infernal Affairs” differ.  “The Departed” trades the mythic abstract quality of “Infernal Affairs” – with its limited steel color palette, men in black suits, and clean skyscraper lines – for the gritty approach of “Mean Streets.”  But what I was hoping most for Scorsese to explore was the moral ramifications of the undercover gangster gradually turning into a cop.  But in the gritty, foul-mouthed, and self-serving universe of “The Departed” there’s no room for moral conversion.  It’s every man for himself in a universe without order or ideology. All the “gangster chic” in “The Departed” can get a little old, as these tough men mug and f-bomb to see who’s tougher, over and over.  (I know some audiences can’t get enough of this, but part of what is so refreshing about “Miami Vice” is that, after one big dick scene, the interactions with the drug dealers is limited largely to figures and timetables).  So, in a technical sense, I know “The Departed” is probably a better movie – some of the framing and pacing in “Infernal Affairs” is a bit clunky and chintzy, which is kind of inevitable in a movie with two directors, and “Infernal Affairs” is kind of a “male weepie” in how it treats its ironies and tragedies sometimes. But “The Departed” lacks some of the original’s emotional heft.  And I remember something Paul Schneider said on the “George Washington” commentary, which is that anyone can make a movie about how the world is bleak and doomed, but it takes more courage to make a movie hopeful, and that was the pleasant surprise amidst all the doom of “Infernal Affairs.”  But my wife loved it, and any movie that ends with my dad saying to me “I don’t think your mother would have liked that” is certainly meaty fare for the fellas. Finished Saturday, December 16th, 2006 Copyright © 2006 Friday & Saturday Night                                                                                                                 Back to home.