BadFellas

Earning a place as one of my favorite films ever, The Departed deserves every nomination and award it's received and more. It is a new classic, right up there with GoodFellas and The Godfather. The script is brilliant...intricate, compelling and at times absolutely hilarious.

But brilliant script and direction aside, what makes this film soar is the cast. While I love, love, loved Little Miss Sunshine and its ensemble, I now believe that The Departed may have the best ensemble cast EVER. When we left the film and started to talk about who's performance was outstanding, it became clear that every single actor in the film was at the top of his game. I'm not a big DiCaprio fan. I've always seen him as a little boy, and he's rarely convincing or compelling for me. Not so here. The whole lot... Nicholson, DiCaprio, Damon, Baldwin, Whalberg, Sheen... absolutely amazing. It's in re-release now so I do recommend seeing it in the theater, but it will be on DVD next week and this one is a keeper.

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While we're on the topic of "BadFellas", I watched This Film is Not Yet Rated last night, and MAN... the things I didn't know about the whole MPAA rating system and the bullshit way that works. Thought censorship was a thing of the past? Think again. A very small ("secret") group of people (including selected CLERGY) and corporations are controlling what you get to see and what you don't. (When they slap an NC-17 rating on a film, the release is dramatically impacted. Many, many theaters across the country will not show the film.) Rent it. It's a real eye-opener, and a who-dunit in it's own right.