Review of Donnie Brasco (1997) by Martin S — 19 Apr 2011

"Donnie Brasco" is a crime film from 1997 that was directed by "Luke Newell", written by "Paul Attansio" and stars "Al Pacino",Johnny Depp","Micehal Madsen" and "Anne Heche".

It's based on a true story that's about FBI agent "Joe Pistone"(Depp), who went undercover and infiltrated the New York mafia. He soon meets "Lefty Ruggiero"(Pacino), and "Pistone"( who is now going by "Donnie Brasco") is soon able to embed himself in a mafia faction lead by "Sonny Black"(Madsen). "Pistone" and "Ruggiero" become tight as the group goes about collecting cash for the bosses. The group soon becomes big time when "Black" becomes a boss, so in the meantime "pistone" is collecting as much evidence as he can get his hands on. All this undercover work soon becomes too much for "Pistone to handle, his marriage falls apart and the mafia soon suspect a mole in this whole organization. The real dilemma is afforded to Pistone, and he becomes aware that if he walks away from the mafia, Ruggiero will be the one punished.

The performences in this film are very strong well most noteably from Pacino and Depp who are two great actors you can definitely allways rely on but yea they definitely gave this film there all. I would say it's one of Depp's greatest performences and also one of "Pacino's". The chemeisrty between the two is very well done they are just straight up beliveable as the film goes on you can really see "Depp's" character devolping he starts to completely act like a mobster and it soon becomes apparent that he actually begins to care for his mafia friends especially "Lefty" which ofcourse makes his job alot harder then he may have expected.

"Pacino" is obviously good at playing a gangster and in this film he's playing a different character from what he did in The Godfather series" or "Scarface" this time he's not the big boss he's an aging mobster who brags about how he keeps getting stepped on by all the younger mobsters and he's ofcourse tired of this. He was just simply overly believable like the way he talked acted and reacted at points like one of his most memorable scenes is in this film you will have to watch to no what I mean. The performences were relatively good from all but the two leads ripped it apart and deserve all the praise.

This film aint one of the greatest and there's many crime films and especially many mob films that are alot better then this but for what this is it's very good and worth a look. It's not so much a violent gangster film but more so a drama that goes deep inside the thoughts and personal conflict's of the characters in the story. There's a great original score from "Patrick Doyle" here and it fits the mood of the film quiet perfectely. How great would it have been without the performences? I cant say but the cast was chosen perfectely and everyone involved clearly had a heart for this and made it quiet apparent then all worked hard to bring all fans of Crime/Drama or Gangster films a brilliant one. That's about all I need to say but really take my word this is a spectacular film overall.