Directed by Martin Scorsese

Written by William Monahan from a screenplay by Siu Fai Mak and Felix Chong

Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Jack Nicholson and Mark Wahlberg

149 minutes in CinemaScope

Dearly departed, we are gathered together in a theater for the first time in two years to behold Martin Scorsese’s latest gift. Every sentence in this review should be prefaced by, “I never thought I’d say this, but…” Mr. Scorsese, the apogee of contemporary cinema, the most brutally honest, stylistically cohesive director of his generation, the man who knows more about film history than any other alive and who is my own personal Jesus, has made a truly mediocre film.

With the new millennium, it appears Marty stopped directing films for himself, choosing instead to court Oscar. The last three scripts he sanctioned (Gangs of New York, The Aviator and now The Departed) have more holes in them than the Chicken Ranch, but the screenwriters can only absorb so much of the responsibility.

This is a remake of Andrew Lau and Siu Fai Mak’s 2002 Hong Kong action/policier Infernal Affairs. Perhaps it has something to do with reworking past films. This fits snugly below Cape Fear, his only other remake (unless you count After Hours, which is basically The Wizard of Oz), as the worst picture in his canon.

At least with Cape Fear there was the dreaded Amblin association (Spielberg produced) to point fingers at. A slight connection remains: Writer William Monahan’s next assignment is the fourth installment of the Jurassic Park series. As much as I’d love to once again shoot daggers Spielberg’s way (or toward the slimy, Oscar-baiting Weinstein brothers), it’s impossible. This time the blame falls squarely on Marty’s shoulders.

The story is as old as talkies. Two kids (Leonardo DiCaprio and Matt Damon) grow up on opposite sides of the law, do battle with a mutual enemy (Jack Nicholson in the Jimmy Conway role), and fall in love with the same woman (Vera Farmiga). Instead of a Manhattan melodrama, the action takes place in Boston in 2006, while the haircuts, costumes and dialogue all scream early ’70s. Mark Wahlberg’s hard-assed, tough-talking bull sounds more like an unexpurgated Kojak than anyone currently on the force.

Matt and Leo play moles, one a pampered police academy all-star collecting dirty money from the mob, the other a rookie cop forced to go undercover and infiltrate Nicholson’s crime syndicate.

The one thing Marty seems to liberally borrow from his Hong Kong counterparts (or is it the other way around?) is a thorough misunderstanding of how female characters operate. It has always been his one fatal flaw. Just because Karen Hill gets a good chunk of Goodfellas’ narration doesn’t make her a well-rounded character.

This time, Ms. Farmiga is the story’s main vagina. The only other remotely recognizable female character in the film, Nicholson’s moll, is a whore. Women, and African-Americans, for that matter, only appear to illustrate the protagonist’s heterosexuality and/or anger. It also affords the screenwriters a chance to throw in a few more “cunts” and “niggers” to give Marty a smile and underscore their characters’ venality. What once passed for unerring honesty, as when J.R. rejects rape victim Zina Bethune (her character is simply called Girl in Who’s That Knocking at My Door’s credits) because she is no longer a virgin, now seems part of the shtick.

Monahan claims to have never watched Infernal Affairs before finishing his screenplay, working instead from a translation of the script. So much of this operates as a That’s Entertainment take on the director’s career. A tattooed Leo does Max Cady-like pull-ups in prison. As in Gangs of New York, this film focuses on an Irish mafia. Computer chips, the MacGuffin in the piece, replace the “Jap adapters” from Mean Streets. How did Marty buy into such unabashed sucking up?

Known and beloved for his ability to string together profanity better than a boozed-up sailor who stepped on a rake, this time the “fucks” fall flat. At one point, Ray Winstone threatens to cut a guy’s nuts off. Perhaps cinephile Scorsese, wanting badly to give his young daughter a laugh, intended this as a veiled homage to Scrat in Ice Age.

Even from a technical standpoint the film is sub-par. The editing rhythms are flaccid, the camera frequently in too close and the cigarette continuity laughable. The way those butts keep jumping from frame to frame, it’s a wonder the set didn’t burn down, in particular the cardboard view of Boston from Damon’s window, which is slightly more convincing than the one out Archie Bunker’s front door.

I could go on, but I fear my keyboard will short circuit from all the tears raining down on it. If there is a villainous mole in the piece, it’s neither DiCaprio nor Damon. It’s the rat inside Marty’s camp steering him in the direction of unworthy material.

For a city that basically ignores everything screened outside of a multiplex, San Diego certainly has an inordinate amount of film festivals. There is one for every gender, ethnicity, religion and sexual orientation. I’m half expecting Cinuit: The Eskimo Film Festival. But none are more committed to bringing quality films to town than the San Diego Asian Film Festival. In its seventh season, this year’s outstanding lineup runs at the UltraStar Hazard Center Thursday, Oct. 12, through Thursday, Oct. 19.

Directed by Hou Hsiao-hsien

Written by Chu Tien-Wen

Starring Shu Qi and Chang Chen

135 minutes

Screens Monday, Oct. 16, at 8:00 p.m.

Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao-hsien has been called one of the three most important filmmakers currently at work. I guess San Diego has yet to catch wind of this fact, for we will only have one chance to see his latest masterwork when it screens at the SDAFF. (For some reason, Landmark has refused to exhibit his last works, and as of this writing there is no indication it will get a commercial run.) Given the film’s textured interpretation of light and color and overall breathtaking use of space, much will be lost in a DVD viewing.

A trilogy of romance, Shu Qi and Chang Chen play the romantic leads in three stories, all taking place in different time periods: “A Time for Love” (1966), “A Time for Freedom” (1911) and “A Time of Youth” (2005). On the surface, all three stories are textbook studies of cinematic simplicity.

In “A Time for Love,” we watch, mostly from the point-of-view of a Kaohsiung billiards hall anteroom, the story of two lovers – an employee of the pool hall and a soldier – unfold. He is shipped off to war and we watch as the couple struggle to reunite. When they do, it is on a warm summer night. The simple physical act of two people holding hands, set to the tune of Aphrodite’s Child’s “Rain and Tears,” has never been depicted in a more passionate and delicate manner. Filmmaker Jim Jarmusch called it “one of the most perfect pieces of cinema I have ever seen.”

Act two plays out during the Japanese occupation of China. A married diplomat pays frequent visits to a Dadaocheng brothel, where he wins the respect of one of the prostitutes. HHH strips away all dialogue and ambient sound. The reasoning behind this had more to do with authenticity than simply paying tribute to silent films. HHH was not sure he would be able to accurately replicate the literary Taiwanese dialect from 1911, so he decided to turn it into a silent movie. The person responsible for the dreamlike piano score was not credited in the production notes. HHH refers to him (or her) only as “my friend who is a pianist and a professor.”

The final section unfolds at a time when Taiwan was under the threat of war with China. A young bisexual epileptic enters into a three-way relationship through the comfort and safety of text messages and e-mails. What is most striking is how much more 2005 has in common with 1911 than with 1966.

The film’s tripartite structure is purposely told out of chronology. “A Time for Love” was originally intended as a shorter introductory piece, but the director, “went on too long,” HHH said. One can certainly appreciate why, in this day and age, he was reluctant to open a film with a silent passage. HHH wanted “the first two sections [to] serve as a contrast because I want people to have different points of view about what’s happening in the present time.”

If you see only one film between now and January ’07, why not make it the best picture of the year?

Edited, photographed and directed by Richard Wong

Music and screenplay by H.P. Mendoza

Starring: Jake Moreno, H.P. Mendoza and L.A. Renigen

119 minutes in CinemaScope

Screens Friday, Oct. 13, at 8:30 p.m. and Sunday, Oct. 15, at 2:45 p.m.

At a time when the form has been all but dead and buried on MTV2, an independent filmmaker directs a bouncy CinemaScope musical comedy with an engaging score that also features teenagers who speak and act their age. Will wonders never cease?

That’s exactly what first-time helmer Richard Wong did in his delightful, free-spirited genre film.

Set in Colma, a small town south of San Francisco, we follow the exploits of three close-knit friends fresh out of high school, eager to test their fake IDs and find romance, even if it only lasts a couple of hours.

It begins by blasting the masking out with an unrestrained split-screen musical summation of the dreary town by our jaded trio. Jake (Jake Moreno) is a budding actor strapped with a dull day job and an attraction to fellow thespian Tara (Sigrid Sutter). Party girl Maribel (L.A. Renigen) has two lifestyle alternatives before her: mall employment and getting drunk. Screenwriter H.P. Mendoza, who originally conceived this as a pop album, co-stars as Rodel, the gay iconoclast who, by contemporary cinema’s standards, ultimately suffers the most.

Some of the songs are a bit drippy and the vocals, particularly Mr. Moreno’s, are paper thin. This is also a case where virtually every number is filmed in low-angle tracking shots that become monotonous. Perhaps it was a NyQuil buzz, but I was frequently reminded of Jacques Demy’s superb use of existing locations in The Young Girls of Rochefort, minus, of course, Norman Maen’s imitation of Jerome Robbins’ choreography and the type of stylistic pyrotechnics only a bigger budget can afford. Colma takes some unnecessary serious turns in act two, but overall this merry labor of love comes recommended.

Also included in this year’s festival is Almost Normal: Life in Queer Shorts, a 92-minute program of eight films that will run on Friday, Oct. 13, at 6:30 p.m. I only had a chance to screen a couple, but if this one is any indication, you’re in for a good night at the movies.

For its first half, Josh Kim’s seven-minute The Police Box is your basic filmed anecdote. Two bar patrons of opposite sexes pay particularly close attention to a beat cop who checks into a police box at approximately the same time each night. The young woman writes “Do you have a girlfriend” on his log, but it’s the young man the cop is interested in. Short, sweet and cute, but don’t get out of your seat quite yet. Given that most of today’s generation of box office-savvy filmgoers would rather read a weekly grosses gloss than sharp criticism, Kim replays the film, this time noting where every cent of the film’s $4,809 budget was spent.

For more information, visit

www.sdaff.org.