memento_mori's Movie Review of Gangs of New York (2002)

One of Scorsese's weaker works.
memento_mori - wrote on 07/16/13

Possible Spoilers

I am a big Martin Scorsese fan, and I love a good period piece, and I don't know where it fell short, but this movie felt like it was missing something.
Daniel Day-Lewis and Leonardo DiCaprio are two of my favorite actors, and here they do a phenomenal job. They just have nothing to back them up.
The whole movie feels like it has no ambition, like it's afraid to do something. Barely anything happens after the stunning opening war sequence.
Revenge is (In the words of Quentin Tarantino) one of the classic staples of drama. Yes, it is very much so. But here, it feels like another plot device to fill the runtime. We are supposed to care for Amsterdam Vallon, whose father was killed by Bill Cutting in the opening, but he does virtually nothing when he comes face to face with him. He decides he will choose a specific day to kill him. Why not just kill him there? Because otherwise the film would end twenty minutes into the movie.
That's a flaw in the script, and it shows so much.
The relationship between Amsterdam and Jenny feels completely forced and like another convenient plot device, so that when Jenny is threatened Amsterdam has something more to fight for.
I won't go too much into detail about this, but near the end of the movie there is a confrontation and a battle started by Amsterdam. He has supposedly endured so much that he has had it and wants to fight against Cutting. This character change is set up so poorly. The expression on his face is exactly the same when he offers the challenge and executes the challenge: Bored. And we're supposed to believe he's doing this for the good of his country. And what followed was possibly the most underwhelming finale I've ever experienced in a film.
What I do like about the film is that it doesn't shy away from showing you what happened during the New York Draft Riots. It doesn't tell you how to feel, it just shows you the truth about what happened. A violent massacre.

Other than the spectacular performance from Daniel Day-Lewis and the visually pleasing production design, I can't understand why this movie was even considered for Best Picture. It feels very generic and forced, many plot points are left undiscussed and are only there to bring the movie forward.

Sorry Scorsese, it's just not as your other efforts.