Review of Black Mass (2015) by Griffin J — 02 Apr 2016

Johnny Depp's career hasn't exactly been kind to him for the past several films. Is it his agent's fault? Poor casting directors? Tim Burton? We may never know, but what is very clear is that Black Mass is easily the most demanding performance the actor has given in years.

The story is based off of the long criminal life of James "Whitey" Bulger (Johnny Depp), one of Boston's most lethal crime lords. After an FBI agent (Joel Edgerton), who is an old friend of Bulger's, asks Depp's character to help the FBI bring down the Italian mob, all hell slowly begins to break loose. Not only does Bulger have protection from the FBI, but his brother (Benedict Cumberbatch) is also the Senate President for the State of Massachusetts. The question that was constantly running through my head at nearly every scene was, "how the hell did these people manage to cause this much chaos?".

The film relishes in it's source material by having Johnny Depp do some utterly terrible things. Make no mistake, this is a gritty and violent movie that wants to inform the audience about one of the most disturbing cover-ups in America's history of crime. However, the film does feel a bit hollow as a result. Unlike, say, a film by Scorsese (who Cooper must be compared to) like Goodfellas or Wolf of Wall Street, this movie leaves you feeling kind of dirty by its ending. All of these people did horrible things, seemingly because they could get away with it, and there is not much that humanizes them.

James Bulger's arc essentially starts with him being a crooked and violent thug, and ends with him being one of the most despicable criminals seen on screen in years. Even at his worst, Joe Pesci managed to be likeable and interesting while playing as a gangster, but Johnny Depp isn't given a script that leaves him any room to be human. In fact, the film is constantly jumping between different characters so much that it can be hard to latch onto exactly who is the protagonist we should be rooting for. There are a plethora of great actors giving great performances, but ultimately, there is no one here to like and nobody to sympathize with. It's a well made film that is, in the end, hindered by its source material.