More longwinded movie reviewing from yours truly

[dotinthesky]

Gangs of New York works as the direct opposite of The Age of Innocence. While Gangs of New York has a triangle formed by two men and a woman, The Age of Innocence has a triangle formed by two women and a man. The first is a story that was written by a man (someone appropriately called Jay Cocks), and which largely follows the themes that some men like to use: revenge, war, prostitutes, fights, anger, politics, corruption, blood, fatherhood, brotherhood, booze, protection of weak women. The Age of Innocence, on the other hand, was written by a woman and although one could claim that it was a girly man movie, it's perhaps a more sensitive take on the relationships between men and women in high society. Both movies are set in New York during the 19th century, but one is centred on the lowest scum while the other tells the story of the elite.

Shakespeare is the theme, in particular Hamlet. Amsterdam wishes to revenge the murder of his father (Pastor Vallon) by Mr. Cutting, but ends up becoming his protege (i.e., Mr. Cutting is his Stepfather.) Even one of the characters says to Amsterdam "How much like Shakespeare. Do you know who is Shakespeare? He wrote the King James Bible." Instead of calling him Amsterdam, they should have gone ahead and called him Denmark. Another typical Shakespeare motif: blood baths and fights "on stage" with plenty of dramatic deaths. Sadly, they don't follow the Shakespeare line until the end... because there's a happy end.

Gangs of New York seems to be more concerned with trying to pass itself off as a historical movie. Scorcese cares more about going into detail about the period, the various historical personages, rather than concentrating on the fictional characters (which is what he did in The Age of Innocence.) Because of that, the movie is long (and feels long) and there's less sense that a story is being told (you know from the beginning where it's all going to end, and you are disappointed.)

The movie's final message is simplistic: "These people contributed to New York!" those fading gravestones want to say.

Characters are not coherent. Amsterdam throws the bible in the sea and yet he's a devout Catholic who carries a saint's medallion and helps protect a church (and if we are supposed to believe that he shifts into that devoutness then I want to see where exactly that happens!!) His prostitute girlfriend Jenny is a sketch. And Mr. Cutting is overblown and over-the-top (too bad he didn't get an Oscar for all that work - maybe he should have thrown in a gimpy leg for more effect.)

Scorcese explains too much and tries to fit everything about the city at that particular time. The movie would have been better if he just let those things come through during the story and left it up to the audience to find out more if they were really interested. Or make a documentary as a tie in to the movie.

The soundtrack sucked. It starts out pretty badly with the first battle scene, which includes an electric guitar solo!? And the sentimental dross shows up again with an old irish ballad about the civil war while we see those "moving" scenes of the Irish conscripts. And, just to make sure everyone in the cinema pukes, the credits roll with Bono singing.

The final, and most horrible, sentimental scene comes with Mr. Cutting's tomb being shown right beside Pastor Vallon's - meant to reinforce the idea that they were "different" but equal in their "important" shaping of New York. And why did Scorcese show New York changing through the years and end with the Twin Towers? (the movie was released in 2002.) Is there no history after the Twin Towers? Did he do it out of respect (or maybe because that was a horror not caused by the Irish?) Or perhaps the editing was done before the 11th of September. If he had shown the Twin Towers gone it would have fallen neatly with the melodrama played out throughout the movie. Who couldn't cringe at Amsterdam killing his buddy with the prostitute's gun? (eventhough he had just kicked his buddy out of town and had every reason to wish him dead?)

The kind of movie that this girly man will never see again.

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Tambem fiquei com vontade de dormir. Eta filminho demorado...