I remember when I first saw the previews to this movie. I wasn't really too impressed and had a sinking feeling that the best parts of the movie were being shown in the previews. I should have stuck with my first instinct.

My interest was sparked when my brother had said that he thought it was a good movie and wouldn't mind owning it. I took it upon myself to order it and send it to him as a gift. He's never been an easy person to buy for, I'll jump at an opportunity to get him something that he actually wants. His tastes are strange and hard to figure out.

When it arrived, before sending it to my brother, my father saw it sitting there waiting to be packaged up when he said he'd be interested in seeing it. Between my brother liking it and my father wanting to watch it, I figured I'd go ahead and rent it, on dvd.

The Movie:

Gangs Of New York starring Daniel Day-Lewis as William Cutting a.k.a. Bill the Butcher, Leonardo DiCaprio as Amsterdam Vallon, Cameron Diaz as Jenny Everdeane, Jim Broadbent as William "Boss" Tweed, John C. Reilly as Happy Jack, Liam Neeson as Priest Vallon, Henry Thomas as Johnny Sirocco, Brendan Gleeson as Walter "Monk" McGinn left me disappointed and mildly entertained.

An epic movie that should have been of epic proportions opens with an almost epic battle scene. When you see the very beginning you have a sense of hope, and not just because of all the violence, all though it does grab your attention. I can't help but think of one of Day-Lewis' previous movies, The Last Of The Mohicans, with the display of crude weapons and gory fighting. It seemed rather uncivilized and maybe even unnecessary.

Young Amsterdam is the son of Priest Vallon. Priest Vallon is the leader of the Irish immigrants that live in what seems to be a city within a city, torch lit, and poverty stricken. The Irish immigrants have formed a gang and call themselves The Dead Rabbits. Priest Vallon prepares to go into battle with the opposing gang The Native Americans, which William Cutting (Bill the Butcher)leads. All this is for control over The Five Points.

Priest Vallon has a bonding moment with his son and gives him some life advice and some In Case I'm Not Around 101 kind of talk. Dad takes a shave before battle and cuts himself, gets blood on the blade, and sonny boy goes to clean it. He tells the son to leave the blood on the blade and that one day he'll understand why and then you get into all this symbolism and sentimental bull dinky.

All the Dead Rabbits if I remember correctly leave their den in an organized manner. The battle commenced pretty much the same way, so organized, kind of unnatural. Oh, and of course before they began to fight some words were spoken that don't really come to mind, because it wasn't that memorable. Before they fought I also couldn't help but feel like they were going to break out into song and dance. Kind of a Broadway touch. One reviewer had even said she was expecting them to snap their fingers as well. I couldn't have said it better myself.

After the Priest goes down the others get called off and the fight is over. As the Priest lays there on the ground the son runs over to him, a few more words were spoken, and then I believe the Priest basically tells Bill The Butcher to finish the job that he started and the Priest is put out of his misery. Bill, even though the murderer of Amsterdam's father decides to spare the boy and sticks him in some kind of Catholic home or "House Of Refuge". In Bill's mind that makes him some kind of honorable guy and he thinks what he isn't doing for the boy.

Sixteen years go by and Amsterdam is released from the hellish home he was put in. He gets off a ship in 1862 and is back home for the first time. Amsterdam finds himself in a city that is nothing like what it used to be. Bill The Butcher is judge, jury, and executioner. Bill runs the show and the only way to elevate yourself is to be in with Bill.

Bill is a large and in charge kind of guy and many people support him, even the people that once stood at Priest Vallon's side. The city, Bill, the politicians, and practically everyone is corrupted. Most are fearful of Bill and either stay clear of him or instead work for him, but none have the guts to stand up to him or disobey him.

Amsterdam has plans of revenge and grand ones at that. He isn't in the city for very long when a guy recognizes him. Amsterdam confirms who he is to this guy that turns out to be sort of a childhood friend, Johnny. See, now this is the part that ticks me off. If he had all these plans of revenge and remaking his life, telling anyone who he really is has got to be the stupidest thing you could ever do. One more thing, what the heck kind of name is Amsterdam anyway? He's suppose to be a son of an Irish immigrant, yet he has a name like Amsterdam, which only reminds me of the very Dutch city in the Netherlands.

Moving right along, before my review mimics the pacing of the movie. Johnny introduces Amsterdam to Jenny the pickpocket, which later on Amsterdam ends up falling for, while helping Amsterdam work his way into Bill's inner circle. Jenny too is connected to Bill, which Amsterdam later finds out and is disgusted by. Jenny is kind of tramp and most everyone has had their turn at her, except for poor Johnny, who believes himself to be in love with her. Never really understood that part either. That is him loving her and her not wanting him but willing to be with everyone else.

Amsterdam gets deeper into Bill's circle and becomes his right hand man, or even a surrogate son. Amsterdam's intentions are to play the game until the anniversary of his father's death comes along. The death of his father and battle victory are celebrated every year by Bill and he invites many people to celebrate with him. Amsterdam remembers, "when you kill a king, you don't stab him in the dark. You kill him where the whole court can watch him die."

The only problem with this plan is that dear Johnny decides to betray his friend. He goes and tells Bill of Amsterdam's plans. Bill is happy that Johnny has told him, but is a man of principle in some sick way and punishes Johnny for being a rat and telling on his friend and hangs him on a fence post.

All this could have been so easily avoided if Amsterdam had kept his identity a secret to ALL. Johnny did this awful deed out of jealousy because he came bearing gifts at this church meeting/function where they could have been dancing the funky chicken for all I know or care, and gifts and all Jenny denied Johnny and picked little greasy headed, dirt bag, unshaven, no gift, Amsterdam. Seriously though, if he had stuck his head in a toilet and gave a flush he would have looked cleaner.

Later in the movie Amsterdam attends the celebration (anniversary of his father's death) with full intentions of carrying out his plan. Although, he is struggling with himself because as much as he hates Bill and what he stands for, he in some ways sees Bill as a father and has very much befriended him.

Bill was prejudice man, hateful of Irish immigrants and other immigrants as well. He was literally spitting on them as they came off the boats, while very patriotic and proud to be a native. The injury caused to his eye by the Priest was filled with a glass eye that was designed with an eagle on it, doesn't get more patriotic than that. Quite unique actually. But, getting back on track, Bill is very much aware of Amsterdam's plan and when up on stage throwing knives at Jenny as part of the stage act, he purposely gets dangerously close to killing Jenny. Bill is quite good with a knife and Amsterdam knows this and senses something isn't right.

After some showy stuff Bill exposes Amsterdam for who he is and drags him up on stage to make an example out of him. He decides that his proper punishment will be to take a hot blade to his face and disfigure the boy's face for life, letting everyone know what happens to someone that he takes under his wing and has plans of turning on him.

After Amsterdam runs away, licks his wounds and heals a bit. Jenny helps care for him. The funny thing is after a short period of time his scar is nothing more than a faint pink mark on his cheek. Unless Amsterdam's true secret identity is Superman, there's no way he could heal like that, that fast, and when the whole side of his face should have been miserably scarred. It was just ridiculous!

So as you might have already guessed, Amsterdam revives the old Dead Rabbits gang and decides to pick up where his father left off. Some don't respect him, believe that he isn't like his father and doesn't stand for what his father did, while others are too scared and happy with what Bill's reign has done for their lives and position, and choose not to join forces. Amsterdam does manage to rally some though and they have a battle in the middle of the Draft Rebellion, and I will say one thing, this final battle was extremely disappointing and ridiculous to say the least. I'm not even going to go into detail because it's not even worth talking about. Plus if you do actually decide to watch this movie, I'll let the ending be a surprise.

Conclusion:

This movie, although very different from, reminds me of "The Hours". Both movies I didn't care for, but liked this one a little better than the other. Both were slow, drab, boring, at times confusing, left questions that probably aren't worth getting answers for and were basically pointless.

Such as, Jenny had a scar where the baby was cut out of her and it turned Bill off. (This establishes a relationship between the two, but I don't think they ever confirmed who's child it was exactly). She said she guessed he didn't like seeing scars on women. I thought they could have given a better explanation.

They also never seemed to reveal what happened to that child. Did it die? Was it living? Was I sleeping when they came up to this part?

Both movies left me with the feeling of who cares. Both left me knowing about as little at the end as I did from the beginning. Both seemed incomplete and had me waiting for the story to pick up and for something of real significance to take place. Hey, and now that I think of it, both movies had John C. Reilly, but I can't say that he did a bad job in either movie.

The other thing is, the writers betray you in this movie. Bill The Butcher is a man of certain principles and when they had him go against his own grain when killed a man with his back turned. It just wasn't part of Bill's code of conduct, and they had him stab the guy in the back no less. It just made absolutely no sense. It was like someone's kid stole the script or story and took over.

The only thing that was different between the two is that Gangs Of New York was violent, ALMOST had a point, was ridiculous, a bit more entertaining, couldn't take the movie seriously, the historical relevance was lost, yet it seemed like a story to be used for a Broadway play or a Saturday morning cartoon. That is if you toned down the violence. I don't know which it would be more suitable for.

Recommended:
No

Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age