Infernal Affairs v. Departed

Matt Damon's continual sheep impression did it for me.

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I have to say that I prefer The Departed to Infernal Affairs. Infernal Affairs just seems to try and be more darker (in tone) than it should be, whereas The Departed relishes in it's plot structure and still finds time to be quite entertaining. I like the cast more as well, and was Dicaprio's best performance thus far.

I didn't care for The Departed. I thought it was a decent genre film, but a literal and unnecessary remake. I'm not sure why Scorsese chose the material. It's basically Scorsese on cruise control. This isn't the first time he remade a film.

Cape Fear was a remake of a 60's film and his version was brilliant because it added so many layers and themes that were only hinted at in the original. Infernal Affairs was good enough that it didn't need a remake, especially one that was so close to it.

As a showcase for acting it's fine. Jack Nicholson plays a role he could sleepwalk through in playing the stereotype of himself. DiCaprio and Damon are good, but their characters are pretty thin, despite the opportunity to flex some acting muscle.

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I chose The Departed because the actors are more well known to me for starters, and since it's a bit tough 'feeling' the other actors actual 'acting' while reading subtitles, then Leonardo DiCaprio, and Matt Damon exceeded on that fact alone in the Departed. (Though that is not their counterpart's fault but the fault of my own limited understanding of other languages)
Jack Nicholson was a far better mob boss compared to that little annoying Chinese dweeb who hardly looked intimidating at all. He also died in a better fashion than him. I liked the fact that both key characters died as opposed to having one live and one die in Infernal Affairs.
And finally, I enjoyed the humor in it more so than the original. e.g. Mark Wahlberg's and Alec Baldwin's little back and forth jabs at each other.

Infernal Affairs wasn't so bad but The Departed was a hell of allot more fun to watch.

Never watched the departed because I like Infernal Affairs too much.

Maybe I should seeing as people are choosing it over the original which is very rare with remakes! I think however I will watch it and say its awful and spam up the boards with hate!

I think I will end up agreeing with adidasss when I watch it.

Also the Oscars suck. Never any decent films in there.

I watched The Departed last night. Though an adequate remake it's pretty sad when Leonardo DiCaprio is the best actor in it. Too much self-caricature from Nicholson and Baldwin, hate Mark Wahlberg and Matt Damon has yet to act in a movie as far as I'm concerned. Decent ending, but there was some bloatedness around the midsection that I found unremarkable. I wonder why people praise him for this movie so much when it's mostly the screenplay that carries it? Maybe they miss seeing the shootouts, but this was no Goodfellas by any stretch. It's watchable, but I still like Infernal Affairs better.

One thing that bothered me was I kept hearing that Scorsese did not watch the original, and I remember him saying as much on the Tonight Show. If this is the case, why did some scenes strike me as shot-for-shot from IA? Unfortunately I don't have the two to make a comparison, but really that would be one hell of a coincidence.

didnt see Internal Affairs buts it hard to imagine with the great performances characters and story line in Departed that it can be beat

Err, yeh, those things are all in the original. And it does beat The Departed.

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I like Leo's work, and, I think Martin Scorsese does, too. At one point in time, I wasn't a fan of 'ol Leo, but, I think he has proven himself at this point. Nicholson was at his scene stealing best, and the other cats held it down pretty well. The only player I wasn't over the moon about was Vera Farmiga's mediocre Madolyn.

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YIKES!! I think DiCaprio is a wicked actor. He played that part perfectly and deserved to be highly rated there above the others......even Jack Nicholson.

Infernal Affairs. Just watch it and see! Theres something about it so captivating it's incredible, the story isn't anything new for Asia and not really special elsewhere, but its made so well. I found The Departed dull and lifeless in comparison!

infernal affairs is very overrated. Its a film that got away with murder cos its foreign.
an average foreign film gets made and will be praised for cinematography. This alone will get it hundreds of oscar nominations despite the crap script.

i seen lots of hollywood films with fantastic cinematography and an average script but it gets hammered by critics and moviegoers.

I am chinese so saw infernal affairs in its original language. Let me tell u, the dialogue is downright crap. A 5 year old could have written it. It was very amatuer.

the basic plot of undercover gangster and cop was good but the charcter development was poor.

the reason why many non chinese like it is because the subtitles for whichever language u speak makes the dialogue better than it really was.

hollywood has its own cliches. Just in case people werent aware, so does hong kong cinema. And they havent learnt how to avoid them as well hollywood yet.

infernal affairs had plenty of them.

the departed was an ok film. The acting was better because it wasnt as self conscious.

Both films were overrated. check out die hard or the first rambo. far superior films

Very interesting Thanks

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Just for the record, I wanted to give you negative rep but pushed the wrong button. I wanted to take you seriously but then I read the last sentence and changed my mind. However, for my own piece of mind, I'll say a few things. First off, I watch plenty of "foreign" films, most of them Asian and I can tell a good film from a bad one just fine thank you very much. Subtitles don't pose a specific problem for me because I watch all films with subtitles, American or otherwise. Infernal affairs isn't exactly a masterpiece, but it's definitely a very good thriller. Anyone that watches more than a few "foreign" films a year has learned to appreciate them as much as American films, the cinematography and production has evolved to the point where it's expected that "foreign" films look as good as American ones.

Now, obviously, a lot of people thought the script for Infernal affairs was pretty good otherwise it wouldn't have become one of the most popular Chinese films in the last decade (and lead to a sequel and a prequel), and it certainly wouldn't have grabbed the attention of one of the world's greatest directors and the Academy (which essentially awarded the Chinese authors by giving Scorsese the Oscar).

I can think of a lot of films that are far superior to both The Departed and Infernal affairs, American and foreign, Die Hard and Rambo definitely aren't some of them.

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To add to that - Unless the person that they hired to translate the dialogue for the subtitles was possessed by the ghost of, say, Thomas Hardy then they'd have, basically, translated the spoken words.


To have someone tell me that the dialogue was 'downright crap' on the basis that we don't understand Chinese (that was the inference, apologies if I'm wrong) is.....ermmm....downright crap.

I quite liked Infernal Affairs, it was clever and I was pretty amazed at how closely scene for scene Scorsese followed it. That having been said, I'm sorry, but for all its Brat pack actors the cast of The Departed was much better. Most asian actors in crime movies spend too much time trying to exude western cool to give much of a performance.

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Okay, a few points.

- Foreign films do not get hundreds of oscar noms. In fact if it's in a foreign language it's pretty much guaranteed to be cut out of the top awards. The academy likes to dole out cinematography, art direction, costuming etc. just to say they gave a great film *something*. Most people who know film in the US think the oscars to be a pile of crap numbers game anyway.

- I'm Chinese so it's not like you're the only one here who didn't need the subtitles. That said I don't think IA was that great but I definitely wouldn't call it crap.

- Most people in the US still don't know the movie exists, so I can't call it overrated. If anything The Departed is. Scorcese gets an oscar for this, but none for Raging Bull, Taxi Driver, Goodfellas...uh huh. But if you're basing this on message board hype, especially ones like IMDB, I can see why you'd say this. Some people like to go on and on about something just because they think no one else knows about it.

- It's kind of funny that you cite Rambo as a alternative to cliches.

you're welcome.

let me guess.....you're one of those who think people that like infernal affairs and scorcese are genuis's. Anyone who likes die hard and rambo are dumb.

am i correct in that assessment? if u are, then i wont take u seriously either.


maybe ur trying to convince yourself but there is no guarantee that the translator can translate the words exactly how they were spoken.

and this can happen in any situation. common sense mate.

if a bad american film showed one man say to his friend " yo yo, cheer up dude. i'm here for u man...chill man"

and the foreign subtitles says "cheer up my friend. I'm here for you. always". This makes all the difference does it not?

and u dont have to agree with my posts but dont get personal by saying they are crap. I was criticsing the film, not u.

I'm not afraid to admit that i love rambo and die hards. and that i dont like infernal affairs. and i will willingly say that i think they are superior films in every way.

die hards and rambos have a simple plot but they are character driven and not self concious.

The movie world has brainwashed people into thinking that those films are dumb action flicks and that they cannot be deemed intelligent which is not true.

I am not one of those who watches rambo more than the departed and then tell people that i think scorcese is brilliant and disregard rambo.

maybe i came on too strong. I dont think infernal affairs was crap (the dialogue was a bit. i still stick to that) but i do think its overrated and the chratcer development could have been better.

No you're not correct. First off, Die hard is an action film slash comedy. Rambo is an action film that inadvertently became comedic. Big difference. Second, as I clearly stated, I don't think Infernal affairs is a classic, I think it's a very good thriller and an enjoyable watch. Scorsese on the other hand has made enough classic films to be regarded as a genius (even if I don't like his latest films too much). And last but not least, I don't think people who claim Rambo and Die hard are brilliant films (although the first installment of Die hard is a great and very influential action flick) are necessarily stupid. I think your post as a whole was pretty daft and presumptuous...However, I'll refrain from passing judgment on your intelligence...for now...

Huh? So you're saying that the filmmakers aren't professional enough to hire translators who can give an accurate representation of what is being said?

I'd like to think that I'm bilingual enough to get by in a 'foreign' cinema without subtitles. Ok, maybe not Chinese, but I'm assuming that you're (or ur) generalising.

The amount of times that I've laughed at subtitle translation (or had it pointed out to me by a native speaker watching with me) can be counted on one hand. Usually you'll find that the 'mistakes' are just differing opinions on the occasional noun.

Ok then, you don't get my sense of humour. Don't fly off the handle by thinking I said that you don't have a sense of humour - I'd never be so presumptuous!

Just out of interest, what HK films would you recommend which have a better (i.e. not written by a '5 year old') dialogue and character development. I'd imagine that there are quite a few.