Ocean's Eleven had George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Don Cheadle, Julia Roberts, Andy Garcia and so many other important actors. On the other hand, The Departed has even bigger stars, Jack Nicholson, Leonardo Di Caprio, Matt Damon [being the commoner in both these film], Martin Sheen and Mark Wahlberg. Both the films are equally "enriched", however the latter, is obviously a greater film.
A pleasant surprise in "The Departed" was seeing Matt Damon playing the bad guy, he seems a very nice guy like Martin Sheen. Can't think of these two men being unreasonably harmful . But Damon did surprise me. Loved this change.
Now lets talk about Jack Nicholson, he was not playing Jack again. The last two Jack Nicholson film I saw, he played Jack in "The Shining" and "Batman". Remember the sentence on the letter pad "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." Now he is what we call the perfect bad guy. I just love him seeing as an antagonist. Even in 1980, in "The Shining" he looked as ferocious as in 1989 in the Tim Burton's "Batman" and the intensity was no less in "The Departed" in 2006.
The Joker aka Heath Ledger was a legendary portrayal of a villain and truly he is the most anarchic and one of the most loved character of all time. But I find it really discomforting, when some people simply thrash Jack Nicholson's portrayal of The Joker in 1989's "Batman". Truly he was no less and people do love him for it.
Okay, getting back to "The Departed", Leonardo Di Caprio may be the protagonist of this film [or may not be], but I loved the Matt Damon part more than his. Just loved the corrupt form of him, it was a wonderful experiment,
The Performances by Mark Wahlberg and Martin Sheen are good too, this was the first time, I could really appreciate Mark Wahlberg. He had more expression this time, I think the credit should also go to Martin Scorsese for making him act.
The Departed beat "Babel", "Letters from Iwo Jima", "Little Miss Sunshine" and "The Queen" to win the Academy Awards for the Best Picture. However another great film which came that year and Academy totally ignored it was "The Prestige."
I am really disappointed with the way "The Prestige" was treated that year at Oscars. It wasn't even nominated. It had the quality of what makes a movie get nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars.
But then again, it was Christopher Nolan. Is this only me or do you also think that "Christopher Nolan" is never taken too seriously by the Academy. He is one, gem of a filmmaker. People love his films. Oscars doesn't really show much love.
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