Anyway, my opinion on The Departed has moved quite a bit over the years.
I saw it in theaters, with a packed house, and people were really into it. I thought it was very fun, and enjoyed it...but I didn't think it was anything more than that. I almost thought of it like Ocean's Eleven, like Scorsese doing something silly and enjoyable very well, but that it wouldn't really have any staying power once the twists and turns were known in advance. So for a year or two, that was my opinion: lots of fun, nothing else to see, one of his lesser works in terms of, ahem, art.
Then for whatever reason I popped it on to kill some time one day, and kinda...kept doing that. It became a frequent background film in the evenings, something to put on when I wasn't sure what to watch. Knowing everything that happens in advance made it more enjoyable, not less. I appreciated the way the story unfolds a lot more (and well as the acting and staging of each scene) when I didn't have to expend as much focus keeping up with the breakneck pace it inflicts on you in that first viewing.
Once I realized The Departed is a farce, I started enjoying it even more. All the things that seemed a little unserious about it suddenly seemed necessary and deliberate.
I still wouldn't put it among his best, but I've come around to the idea that it's actually a very good film.
I saw it in theaters, with a packed house, and people were really into it. I thought it was very fun, and enjoyed it...but I didn't think it was anything more than that. I almost thought of it like Ocean's Eleven, like Scorsese doing something silly and enjoyable very well, but that it wouldn't really have any staying power once the twists and turns were known in advance. So for a year or two, that was my opinion: lots of fun, nothing else to see, one of his lesser works in terms of, ahem, art.
Then for whatever reason I popped it on to kill some time one day, and kinda...kept doing that. It became a frequent background film in the evenings, something to put on when I wasn't sure what to watch. Knowing everything that happens in advance made it more enjoyable, not less. I appreciated the way the story unfolds a lot more (and well as the acting and staging of each scene) when I didn't have to expend as much focus keeping up with the breakneck pace it inflicts on you in that first viewing.
Once I realized The Departed is a farce, I started enjoying it even more. All the things that seemed a little unserious about it suddenly seemed necessary and deliberate.
I still wouldn't put it among his best, but I've come around to the idea that it's actually a very good film.