Gangs of New York...was it really so bad?

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fishbulb

New member
Just watching it again on Ch4..and on my own without any input whatsoever, and engrossed.

The first time I saw this movie, I must admit to not taking any of it in due to bad press.

I was too ready to agree with just about anything they threw at this movie.

But now, watching it again many years later, and without input from anyone else, I'm bloody enjoying it...and I say that as a join in critic at the time :o :)
 
I was very torn with this film - I quite enjoyed it but really only for Daniel Day Lewis, who was superb as always

It just didn't grab me for some reason, I think Leo et al are a bit too pretty and clean to be realistic
 
This movie is crap. I can't remember the critics not liking it, in fact i usually only go to the cinema when critics rave about movies. I like Scorsese usually, and even Day Lewis, but this movie is just embarrassingly (sp?) dire. I nearly walked out (which i never do) but had to stay to see if DDL's impersonation of De Niro got any better, which it didn't.
This is one of the most disappointing movies I've ever seen.
(The views expressed here are my own, sorry if they offend)
 
This film was a bit of a mixed bag!
I thought DDL was incredible!
And I loved the opening sequence.

But De Caprio & Diaz put me off, and I ususally like DeCaprio!

I really wanted to like it, but it was badly paced and just didn't quite work. All that said it's still quite entertaining, and worth a watch.
 
Day Lewis gave the performance of a lifetime, the opening battle was spectacular and there were some other great scenes but Di Caprio and Diaz were superfluous (i don't think Diaz was anywhere near as bad as a lot of people made out, she was just sorta..there) and it was just far too long and drawn out.

Overall, not a bad movie and worthwhile for Day Lewis and the opening battle. I'd rank it alongside Cape Fear, Color Of Money and After Hours in the third-tier bracket of Scorsese flicks.
 
I think the rumoured conflict between Scorsese and the producer didnt help the film...I enjoyed it in the cinema, not so much on my home cinema system....it just doesn't quite have the wow factor on a smaller screen (much like Titanic & Moulin Rouge).
 
I could never make myself actually make the effort to sit down and watch Titanic, so i will reserve judgement, but don't get me started on Moulin Rouge, Lurhman should be locked up for criminal abuse of cellulose.
 
I was under the impression that the critics liked this film.

I liked it, but it did have a very odd feeling about it as though something was a bit off. I think that maybe it didn't have a good flow to it and felt like there were too many slow bits that didn't engage me as much as I would have thought they would.
I thought it was a good film compared to most though.
I think that maybe the story itself wasn't strong enough and what story there was didn't feel as passionate as it could have been.

Are there any reviews of this film that somebody can link me to?
 
What is the point of Di Caprio, he doesn't add anything to the films he's in, Scorcese goes from De Niro as muse to Di Caprio, there's no comparison, awful Irish accent in this too.

I know the film was based on reality but it didn't seem like it, more like a 19th century version of The Warriors but not as good.

Was Daniel Day-Lewis doing a De Niro impersonation because he was originally going to get the role? I disagree with Harry, it sucks though, it was a good impression.
 
I think something that put me off is that it had a cheap feeling to it.
I know they probably spent hundreRAB of millions on it, but there was something about it which made it feel sort of limited.
It didn't feel cinematic and felt sort of cramped and claustrophobic. It went from scene to scene but I never got a sense of place. It all felt restricted to that one street.

It would cut from one scene to another and I would always be wondering where they are in that scene. What building are they in? I needed to see some exterior establishing shots of where they were.
All I remember is that main street as a location and all other scenes felt like they were detatched and filmed in interiors where I couldn't even place in the town.
It's hard to explain, but it felt cramped and small, and simply not cinematic. It went from a scene in one room to another scene in another and I never got the feeling of a real place. It felt like lots of scenes filmed in stuffy interior sets not flowing well together and feeling clumsily stitched together.

I think it needed more exterior shots. Probably big exterior shots.
Everything about it felt small and limited.
I think for a film of that kind it needed to feel cinematic. I know that I'm repeating that word a lot but I do think that's probably what felt lacking to me.

Apart from one or two exterior shots everything else felt more like a play than a movie.
I think for the story it was telling it should have felt more epic and showed more location and scenery.

Like I said I thought it was pretty good, but I don't think I could watch it many times.
And it did feel as though the story was a bit simple and there was nothing that clever about the script as far as I'm concerned.

I was expecting an epic, but it still felt more like it was a TV drama which was limited in it's scope. I felt it should have felt bigger.
So maybe it was mainly the production choices that I wasn't impressed with.

I'm not sure what to think of Daniel day Lewis' character. It was an interesting performance but something about it didn't strike me as him being a real character. He felt more like a cartoon character. The way he spoke didn't feel that natural to me. The performance felt a bit odd to me, although I know that many will disagree with me, it just didn't feel like a real person to me. I'm not saying he was bad, he was probably excellent and the problem is possibly down to my own perception of his character.

And no, I never rated Leonardo Di Caprio either. I never understand why he always seems to get high profile roles.
 
I felt like Diaz and DiCaprio got dragged down by trying to pull off the Irish accent, and both of them making a half-arsed job of it. Their performances were all over the place.

As for DDL, I'm with Alrightmate on this - a talented actor for sure, but something about his character didn't really ring true for me either. I couldn't take him seriously.
 
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