It seems impossible to review Gangs of New York without mentioning its troubled production history, as Martin Scorsese acquired the rights to a nonfiction book by Herbert Asbury in the late ‘70s but was unable to sell the idea on anyone until at least 1991. It would take another decade for shooting to occur, as studios dropped it one after another, and proven Scorsese collaborators such as Robert De Niro and Willem Dafoe left the project when their schedules could not align. Finally, it arrived in December 2002, partly compromised by its meddling producer, Harvey Weinstein, but still a gargantuan and ambitious historical epic, chronicling the violent ethnic divide between the confederacy of “nativist” New Yorkers and the Dead Rabbits, a gang of Irish immigrants, in the decade or so leading up to the Civil War in the United States.
Its story is divided between two perspectives, reflected in the similarly structured prologue that informs us, through narration, of these two sides. On one side is “Priest” Vallon, the leader of the Dead Rabbits, played in a forceful extended cameo by Liam Neeson. On the other side is Bill “The Butcher” Cutting, a ruthless, violent, thoroughly corrupt political figure of sorts played by an utterly terrifying Daniel Day-Lewis in an Oscar-nominated performance. Sporting a glass eye whose makeshift pupil is in the shape of the American bald eagle, a dominant physical stature complemented by a wardrobe that seems uncharacteristically prim and proper for the man, and a truly handsome handlebar mustache framed on each side by his mutton chops, Bill is a genuinely original, unpredictable character, serviced by perhaps the best performance ever given by the actor playing him (no small feat, to be sure).
There are various central conflicts at play in the screenplay, written by Scorsese with Jay Cocks and Kenneth Lonergan, but the whole film is infused with the lingering effects of an opening street battle in which Bill slashes and fights his way to the center of the chaos and fatally stabs Vallon in front of the latter’s son, Amsterdam. The boy is sent to an orphanage and, nearly two decades later, returns (now played by Leonardo DiCaprio) to the Five Points in Lower Manhattan, just as the Civil War is entering its second year of carnage. Amsterdam’s mission is one of revenge, understandably, and along with him he has brought the knife Bill used to kill his father. Trusting that no one will recognize him now that so much time has passed since boyhood, Amsterdam finds himself quickly ascending within Bill’s circle of trust.
The Butcher, meanwhile, is preparing for a more political sort of battle, putting in the hard work of pushing back against the anti-slavery, pro-immigration rhetoric of his eventual rival for the position of sheriff, Walter “Monk” McGinn (Brendan Gleeson) – the only man around who seems to recognize Amsterdam for what he is and to cotton on to his plan for revenge. With Bill in the pocket of fellow corrupt politician William Tweed (a great and boisterous Jim Broadbent) and with crooked policeman Happy Jack Mulraney (John C. Reilly) on his team, the path forward seems impossible for Amsterdam – until he meets petty criminal Jenny Everdeane (Cameron Diaz, whose casting was unfairly maligned as anachronistic despite a fine performance as a young woman with no agency), in whom Bill has a vested interest.
Clearly, the film has an expansive scope, both visually (cinematographer Michael Ballhaus employs warm hues in interior sequences and captures the frigid cold of the outside) and narratively, as Amsterdam’s weeks spent with Bill turn into months and the latter eventually becomes suspicious of his new, young friend. When Bill puts his impulses into action, the results are sudden, violent, and cruel, such as his humiliated reaction to a lost election or the barest minimum of chances that he might lose his control over Jenny. Once again, Day-Lewis is frightening here in the way he can seemingly turn on a dime.
Upon release, the film’s response was a bit more tepid than the usual accolades regarding Scorsese’s work – no doubt a slight overreaction to the troubled production and compromised nature of the final edit. Time has been kind to the film, though, and those compromises have merely become chiseled marks in one of the filmmaker’s most fascinating works, not only once again a study of generational violence on the streets of New York but a big, brash, and bold examination of his own career until this point. Gangs of New York is vital cinema.
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