'Black Mass': Johnny Depp holds the screen as pure malevolence
The film doesn't delve very deeply into James 'Whitey' Bulger's psyche but co-star Joel Edgerton is especially good, as is Benedict Cumberbatch as Bulger's brother William Bulger.
'Black Mass' stars Johnny Depp (r.) and Benedict Cumberbatch (l.).
Claire Folger/Warner Bros. Entertainment/AP
In 鈥淏lack聽Mass,鈥� Johnny Depp plays the notorious Boston crime lord聽Whitey Bulger, and it鈥檚 nice seeing him give a real performance for a聽change, after swashbuckling and mumbling his way through a series of聽clinkers. Despite a makeup job that, with its high-domed forehead and聽slicked hair, makes him resemble a Kabuki samurai, he holds the screen as聽pure malevolence.聽
The film itself, directed by Scott Cooper and written by Mark Mallouk聽and Jez Butterworth, doesn鈥檛 delve very deeply into Bulger鈥檚 psyche,聽which also means that Depp鈥檚 performance more often than not resembles聽a species of horror film monster. The attempts to 鈥渉umanize鈥� him, as in聽the scenes with his doting mother or his young son, are obvious sops for聽our sympathy. The filmmakers do a straightforward job of laying out the聽collusion between Bulger and the FBI, which decimated the influence of聽the Mafia while allowing him to reign in Boston throughout the 鈥�70s and聽'80s until he was forced into hiding in 1994. (Joel Edgerton, as the聽Bureau鈥檚 John Connolly, a boyhood friend of Bulgar鈥檚 growing up in聽South Boston, is especially good). The mob hits and garish murders are聽swift and brutal and effectively staged.
What鈥檚 missing is the high inspiration that set this film鈥檚 models 鈥撀犫�淭he Godfather鈥� movies and Scorsese gangster films and all the rest 鈥撀燼bove the usual mob movie fray. 鈥淏lack聽Mass鈥� is like a playlist of聽greatest hits from other, better movies.
The chance to do something more than this was, I think, inherent in a聽conflict never realized here: The relationship between Bulger and his聽upstanding brother Billy (Benedict Cumberbatch, excellent), who served聽with distinction as the Massachusetts Senate president and later as the聽president of the University of Massachusetts. A movie that focused on those brotherly bonds might have ended up as more than a creditable聽knockoff. Grade:聽B (Rated R for brutal violence, language throughout, some sexual references and brief drug use.)