by Ted Sherman

Created on: February 16, 2007   Last Updated: May 09, 2007

Why all the Oscar hoopla for this bloody piece of tripe? To me the story line seemed to be: Martin Scorsese takes all the guys not killed in his previous gory movies, dresses them up as Boston cops and gangsters of the 1950s, then proceeds to kill them (or kill each other) one by one.

The two clean-cut young heroes, Leonardo DiCaprio and Matt Damon look so much alike, I was confused throughout the movie as to which one was a good guy and which one was a bad guy. They're both handsome actors, and they looked great until the moment the bullets blew their heads apart.

The written script could have been cut down to about one-third if they just eliminated the f-word. It fouled the air from the first moment, dominated every speech in between, and was there waiting to be heard for the nth time as the screen faded to black. I mean faded to red, because everything was covered with blood.

Jack Nicholson as the boss gangster chewed up more scenery than a millennium of mice in Carnegie Hall. His acting was almost as subtle as it was when he played the Riddler in the Batman movie.

If there's an Academy Award for the amount of blood shed in a movie, "The Departed" would win it hands down. Or rather, face down ... in the gutter.

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