The Day De Niro Got Ditched - The Films Of Scorsese & DiCaprio

Partial Education Presents:

The Day De Niro Got Ditched: The Films Of Scorsese & DiCaprio

Featuring Partially Educated Reviews of (in order):
Gangs Of New York
The Aviator
The Departed
Shutter Island
and
The Wolf Of Wall Street

Before the review, a quick note. I have slowly grown to realise that I will never get to a "fully educated" review if I'm only doing one review a week. As a result, I've decided that single film reviews will be saved until that point and I will now be doing themed posts with a few, shorter reviews in each one. As a result, weeks will get missed if I haven't been able to watch enough films as a result of needing to earn actual useable money.

In 1995, Martin Scorsese made Casino, his 8th and final film to date with Robert De Niro. Though there haven't been any falling outs or sinister occurrences in the aftermath to prevent the two from working together again, it does seem like Scorsese has chosen his new golden boy in the form of Leonardo DiCaprio. Obviously, it's worked out fairly well for them, as they're only three films short of matching the number of films that De Niro and Scorsese did together. The thing is; when working with De Niro, Scorsese produced some his best work, with Casino standing right at the top of that pile for me. Does his work with DiCaprio come even close?

No.

But that doesn't mean it's bad.

There's two problems for DiCaprio when placed into Gangs Of New York. The first is that no amount of beard or long hair could prevent him from still looking like a taller version of that kid from What's Eating Gilbert Grape. The second is that he's up against Daniel Day-Lewis. Now, there could be an argument made that any actor who has ever gone up against Day-Lewis has paled when placed against him (to that I serve you Paul Dano in There Will Be Blood). This is one of Day-Lewis' most fun performances. Fun may be a poor choice of word, as William Cutting is a merciless fiend, inflicting some horrifically violent acts and abject misery upon anyone who wishes to cross him, but Day-Lewis goes so heavily for broke that the film is so much more enjoyable when he's in it.

In contrast, when he isn't around, it all feels a bit pedestrian. DiCaprio's OK, but he's ever so slightly dull and never fully establishes himself in the way where you could ever believe in him as the man who will stop Cutting. Furthermore, the forming of his gang feels horribly forced. Yes, people are scared of Cutting, but there's little to suggest that DiCaprio is out for anything more than revenge, with the "greater good" feeling a bit surplus to requirements. As for Cameron Diaz, her "will they, won't they, is the latter even an option?" romance with DiCaprio is nothing that you haven't seen many times before. 

What of the film itself? It's good, but it's nothing to write home about. The narrative of the main revenge story is predictable and, for the side-plots, it's handling of wider issues spreads itself incredibly thin by trying to deal with too much and not really having a whole lot to say that you won't already know. Apparently, racism's bad. Who'd have thought? Genuine glimpses of excellence are few. In fact, there's two of them. One's Day-Lewis and the other is the fantastically shot final fight amongst a thick fog of cannon fire dust. Gangs Of New York is fine, but it's a shaky start to this partnership and, at times, it can be hard to see exactly what Scorsese saw in DiCaprio. The constant delays the film endured, along with frequent references to "Scorsese's vision", paved two roads with one going to disaster and the other to masterpiece. Along the way, Scorsese laid another one right down the middle.

THREE out of five

Scorsese's love and impressive knowledge of the history of film would naturally lead him to Howard Hughes, one of the biggest rebels in the history of the film industry. I have to be honest though; The Aviator was never a film that particularly appealed to me, with my own tastes leaning more towards the Spruce Moose than the Spruce Goose. 

As a result, it's the only one of these films that I hadn't seen prior to starting this review. Nice to report, that it's one of the best. In, what I consider, the best role of his five here, DiCaprio is brilliant. It has to be said that despite the film spanning a timeframe of around 20 years, DiCaprio once again decides that the only way you need to show ageing is via a beard, but he is mostly capable of making you forget that. Hughes may come off as arrogant and at times even deluded, but the personality he presented to the outside world is played brilliantly at odds with the private Hughes, halted by a crippling level of OCD. A fantastic scene where Hughes speaks to business rival Juan Trippe (Alec Baldwin) through a door displays the confidence of Hughes through voice, against the frailty of him through appearance and it's moments like these that make it one of the best, or possibly THE best performance of DiCaprio's career so far.

The real "ace in the hole" though is when it comes to cinematography. In that department, this marks Scorsese's third collaboration with Robert Richardson and it begs the question of why Scorsese doesn't work with Richardson on all his films. He's not always worked on the director's best films (one of them's coming up), but he has always excelled and has managed to earn two Oscars for a Scorsese film (this and Hugo). Matching pace with mood, Richardson keeps things fast and frenetic during the exhilarating filming of the dogfight from Hell's Angels and then slows things right down as Hughes reaches his lowest point.

It's not all flawless. Scorsese's films have often felt a bit like a Boy's Club and this is no different. Cate Blanchett gets the best roll of the dice, receiving both moderate screen time and something resembling a fleshed-out role as Katharine Hepburn. Elsewhere though, Kate Beckinsale as Ava Gardner is just there, appearing every so often, but never getting her moment to stand out, while Gwen Stefani (yes, that one) and Kelli Garner, as the other notable women in Hughes' life, get the same treatment, only even worse. This is the best film that Scorsese and DiCaprio have done together, but to pretend it's a flawless one would be untrue.

FOUR out of five

There's a well-subscribed school of thought when it comes to The Departed and that's that it is far from Scorsese's best work. As a result of this, his Oscar win is often seen as a sympathy win in return for all the times he missed out. This means three questions need answering.

1. Is The Departed a bad film? In my opinion, no.

2. Was Scorsese's win a sympathy win? Quite probably, yes.

3. Was there a more deserving winner on the night? Yes. United 93 should have won Best Director and Best Film, but wasn't even nominated in the latter category.

So, there we go, I mostly agree with the consensus when it comes to The Departed, but to class it as a bad film is, frankly, a bit ridiculous, reminiscent of the sort of hysteria that's always generated when personal favourites don't get the award wins.

With a huge cast, favour is falling firmly in the laps of DiCaprio, Jack Nicholson and Matt Damon when it comes to screen time. As a result, some parts are brutally underdeveloped, most notable being James Badge Dale and Anthony Anderson as the respective training buddies of Damon and DiCaprio. They're introduced and then swiftly forgotten about, only to reappear when it's absolutely necessary and then be forgotten about again. The handling of this is crass and, though they represent the greatest extent of this, there are other characters who suffer similar fates.

In general though, the acting is brilliant, with the only real notable blip being Ray Winstone's embarrassingly awful attempt at a Boston accent. DiCaprio manages to break through a barrier here though. Arriving with his baby face looks, his performance serves as the way that he finally sheds this, as he not only appears physically older as the film progresses, but matures in himself to reflect the further horrors that he both witnesses and is subjected to. Combined with Blood Diamond, this helped in the vital task of shedding the boyhood image from DiCaprio that was starting to dog him.

No, The Departed is not Scorsese's finest moment and there's even some really grating errors of judgment in it, most notably in some cinematography twitches that should have never made it past the editing suite. The way the camera zooms in on Matt Damon's face as he says "the departed" couldn't have felt more forced if they'd stuck a musical flourish in there with it. Despite all of this though, The Departed is decent. It's never boring, which hasn't always been the case when Scorsese breaches two hours, and there's a real sense of fun about the film. Had this film taken itself too seriously, it would have been disastrous.

FOUR out five

Speaking of taking things too seriously...

Novelist Dennis Lehane has been fairly lucky when it comes to adaptations of his work. Mystic River wasn't quite flawless, but it was still pretty good. Meanwhile, Gone Baby Gone served as Ben Affleck's directorial debut, a risk that has more than paid off. So, to say that Shutter Island is the worst of the Lehane adaptations is true, but isn't necessarily meant to mean it's a bad film. From an artistic standpoint it sees Scorsese at his most creative. If we go back to The Aviator, the less-naturalistic, almost fantastical, opening of that film serves as a precursor to his approach on Shutter Island. Dream sequences pepper the film throughout, providing clues about the eventual destination. If anything, they could have done with being a little more abstract, as they do give a bit too much away, but the journey there is good fun.

In fact, the whole first three quarters of the film serve it well, with great acting and beautifully menacing cinematography (it's Robert Richardson again). It's a little cliched though, ticking all the boxes you'd expect from a less-respected director and when it comes to the portrayal of mental patients, you're just waiting for one of them to start slapping themself in the head whilst sweetly singing The Itsy Bitsy Spider. It's heavily focussed on DiCaprio (the action never moves away from him) and he is by far the best thing about it, adopting a more melodramatic approach that actually serves to suit the general tone.

It's the ending though that really lets Shutter Island down, hinging on a twist that M. Night Shyamalan would probably consider subtle and ingenious, but in reality, is a little forced and incredibly hard to believe. The bits that you will probably predict work, but the ways in which it takes it further mean that it falls on the wrong side of ridiculous. It doesn't seem to realise this either, with the filmmakers evidently convinced of it's own genius. Of all the DiCaprio/Scorsese team-ups, this is on par with Gangs Of New York as their weakest effort. That's not to say it's bad, but instead it's a deeply flawed film with a poor ending that is only partially rectified by an amazing and perfectly executed final exchange.

THREE out of five

If taken as a portrait of a world, through the eyes of the parasites that inhabit it, The Wolf Of Wall Street works. At the end of the day, Jordan Belfort and chums were (and possibly still are) reprehensible manifestations of greed and arrogance, partially as a result of becoming products of an equally detestable environment. For the most part, the film seems to be aware of this and any sympathy you may feel towards the characters will serve as more of a comment on your own mentality than the film's portrayal of them. On occasion though, it does start to slip into slightly celebratory (and even admiring) territory as the backslapping they give themselves feels a little too revelled in by the film itself.

Despite this, performances are excellent, with DiCaprio (and I'm aware the record is stuck) standing out. This, combined with Django Unchained, is probably the most unhinged you've seen him, looking like he's about to burst a blood vessel at any point. Belfort is a snail of a man, leaving a putrid trail of debauchery and immorality in any area that he decides to inflict himself upon. DiCaprio is out to portray the character with all the bravado and over-the-top personality traits that Belfort would either have had or would have had to adopt to survive. The one thing that felt missing for me was more of Belfort by himself, as I fail to believe anyone with that much bravado doesn't have inferiority issues outside of public view.

The Wolf Of Wall Street is really good, but not quite excellent. It's handling of humour is efficient, mostly feeling as though it's coming at the expense of the characters (see the Lemmons scene for an excellent example). At 3 hours though, the film is too long and is as excessive as the lifestyle that Belfort lived, but in banishing The Great Gatsby from my mind as the most recent work from DiCaprio, it has earned my respect and gratitude. 

FOUR out of five

Next Time: Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's a plank of wood.