BLACK MASS the movie all of Boston has been dying to see, shot right here in our own back yard where these grizzly events unfoldedâis a funereal event. Itâs a solid film, with an impressive central performance by Johnny Depp as Boston crime lord James âWhiteyâ Bulger, but the film itself never rises to the level of greatness like âThe Godfatherâ or even âGoodfellas.â A too lean screenplay and the lack of a compelling, cohesive vision by director Scott Cooper deadens some of the drama. Though the performances are good to great, the tale onscreen seems smaller and less powerful than the actual events warrant. The screenplay fails to flesh out its secondary characters, and the direction doesnât give enough dramatic weight to this tangled web of corruption and its resonance in our city.
Based on the book Black Mass: The True Story of an Unholy Alliance Between the FBI and the Irish Mob by Boston Globe reporters Dick Lehr and Gerard OâNeill (updated to include Whiteyâs capture in 2011), the film does do a good job of delivering the facts about the incestuous relationship between the FBI and Whitey Bulger, a relationship that quashed one group of criminals, the Italian mob, and allowed another criminal empire run by the Irish mob to flourish.
The film begins in 1975 and ends in 1995 with Bulgerâs disappearance and eventual appearance at the top of Americaâs 10 most wanted list. In flashback, members of Whiteyâs Winter Hill Gang, Steve âthe Riflemanâ Flemmi (Rory Cochrane), Kevin Weeks (Jesse Plemons), and hit man John Martorano (W. Earl Brown) dispassionately recount their horrifying stories of murder and intimidation on tape in exchange for immunity or reduced sentences.
The film zeros in on Whiteyâs rise to power. He was already a criminal, had already spent time in Alcatraz, and was a âsmall town playerâ on the ascent in South Boston when he was approached by childhood friend and now FBI man John Connolly (Joel Edgerton). The deal is very clearly spelled out: Connolly proposes an alliance with Whitey to inform for the FBI on their mutual enemy, Bostonâs Italian mafia under the Angiulo family, in exchange for which Whitey and his Winter Hill gang would be left alone, as long as they didnât kill anyone. Right. In effect, the FBI fought Whitey âs battles for him against his Italian rivals, while he grew more powerful and ran roughshod over the city, all in exchange for information that it seems the FBI could either have gotten themselves, or which wasnât all that crucial.
The bare and bloody facts are laid out, no detail spared. Within the first 10 minutes Whitey beats someone to a pulp in broad daylight. The gruesome murders unfold with regularity, and the proceedings unravel like a list. Which brings me to Deppâs performance, on which this undernourished screenplay depends. This is one of the great Johnny Depp performances in a career full of them, and Iâm not talking about the âPirates of the Carribean,â franchise, but rather his nuanced turn in âDonnie Brascoâ in which he plays an FBI man who goes undercover as an informant and discovers he has more in common with the criminals than the FBI.
As Brasco, Depp was clearly Depp, the handsome, almost pretty leading man as complex hero. As Whitey, heâs almost unrecognizeable. Physically heâs an even more evil version of the mysterious gangster weâve seen in pictures, compact and coiled, ready to spring, anytime, anywhere. Deppâs performance seems to take at least part of its cue from the title itself, not only a reference to âMASSachusettsâ during Whiteyâs dark reign, but also a reference to either a Satanic mass, or a traditional Catholic requiem mass for the dead. Depp plays Whitey like a vampire, icy blue eyes, rotten teeth, pale skin, and slicked back hair over a skull like face. In many scenes, often before he kills, he is deathly still, then suddenly white hot. Remarkably, in other scenes he appears intensely and warmly devoted to his young son. That Depp synthesizes these disparate qualities within a single coherent character is no small feat.
Joel Edgerton as John Connolly whom we recently saw as the creepy weirdo in this summerâs thriller âThe Giftâ is again thoroughly convincing. Ditching his native Australian twang for a subtle Boston accent, he renders Connolly as a guy playing all the angles, who knows where his bread is buttered, but is ultimately loyal to his Southey roots, and gradually morphs, scene by scene, into the gangsters with whom he once ran the streets.
But beyond these two pivotal roles, the other actors, though excellent are either wasted or made to seem superfluous in underdeveloped parts. Would that director Scott Cooper (âCrazy Heartâ) and the screenwriters had provided a meatier script for Depp to sink his teeth into. The excellent Sienna Miller who was to have played Whiteyâs girlfriend Katherine Greig was cut entirely from the film. Benedict Cumberbatch is miscast physically as Whiteyâs brother Massachusetts Senate President William Bulger. Not enough is made of this ambiguous relationship; what we are given to understand, in every scene, is only that Billy didnât technically let himself know what he shouldnât know.
Medford Mass native Julianne Nicholson (âMasters of Sexâ/âAugust: Osage Countyâ) is perfect as Connollyâs supportive then resentful wife Marianne who has a terrifying encounter with Whitey in her own home one night. But this scene runs long and should have been truncated to preserve its power. Dakota Johnson (âFifty Shades of Greyâ) is surprisingly affecting as Lindsey Cyr the mother of Whiteyâs son. Kevin Bacon is wasted in an underwritten part as Connollyâs superior at the FBI, but his Boston accent has simmered down since âMystic River.â
At other times the film is downright derivative. Thereâs a moment in a church of a shadowy Depp looking down from on high; later thereâs a great shot of him from above laid out coffin-like on a settee. But the director never takes these images and runs with them, or exploits their thematic implications so they resonate. Another scene, clearly ripped off from a scene with Joey Pesci in âGoodfellas,â has Deppâs character toying with an FBI man over a family recipe. We know exactly where this is going, and so the life goes out of the encounter long before it plays out.
For Bostonians, thereâs lots to recognize: shots of street corners in Dorchester, and Quincy, the stony grey building in Government Center where the FBI is ensconced. Youâll also spot local faces: former WBZ anchorman Scott Wahle fleeing a building, stage actor Lewis Wheeler in a brief speaking part, and Erica McDermott-one of the sistas in âThe Fighterââhere beautiful, black haired, and silent in church.
So I say see itâ but know that the mythic tale has yet to be captured onscreen in all its gruesome glory, unless âThe Departedâ counts. That Oscar Winning 2006 film, partly inspired by Whitey and the gang, also won an Oscar for Scorsese as Best Director. BLACK MASS has a blessed long way to go.