The Untouchables

 

DIRECTED BY-:
Brian De Palma
STARRING-:
Robert De Niro
Sean Connery
Kevin Costner
YEAR OF RELEASE-:
1987
PREMISE-:
During the era of Prohibition in the United States, Federal Agent Eliot Ness sets out to stop ruthless Chicago gangster Al Capone and, because of rampant corruption, assembles a small, hand-picked team to help him.

THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS.

THE NEGATIVES—:

• THE SHOOTOUT AT THE CANADA BORDER

• Plot armor: During the bridge shootout scene at the Canada border, all of our main characters LUCKILY suffer little to no injuries. 

• Why did no one in the cabin seem to acknowledge that everything Malone did to persuade George to testify against Capone, would be considered as duress in a court of law?

• MALONE’S ASSASSINATION

• The bookkeeper COINCIDENTALLY leaves town on the SAME day Malone tracks him down.

• The assassins CONVENIENTLY show up to kill Malone BEFORE Ness arrives at his house. 

• Considering the sheer amount of bullets he took to his body, Malone shouldn’t have been able to stay alive for as long as he did.

• Conveniently, none of the bullets fired at Malone go through his head.

• Just before dying, Malone is conveniently able to reveal important information about the bookmaker’s train journey to Ness and Stone.

• THE STATION SHOOTOUT

• A mother and her infant child are COINCIDENTALLY present at the station at the SAME time the bookkeeper is about to arrive.

• The mother-baby duo reach the top of the stairs at the EXACT time the bookmaker enters the station with his guards.

• Plot Armor : All of the bad guys VERY LUCKILY fail to shoot the good guys and all of their shots CONVENIENTLY miss the baby too. 

• THE CLIMAX

• Ness and Stone ACCIDENTALLY notice that Nitti is carrying a gun inside the courtroom.

• Nitti is CONVENIENTLY carrying the SAME matchbook in which he had written down Malone’s address.

• Why did Nitti try and escape the court hall when all Ness had noticed was that his matchbook had Malone’s address — something which would NOT have incriminated Nitti in any way ?

• Both Nitti and Ness CONVENIENTLY fail to shoot at each other.

• In the initial parts of the chase, Ness LUCKILY falls off the roof onto a platform, instead of falling off of the building completely.

• It was a bit strange that the film didn’t even acknowledge the investigation that would’ve been done about Nitti’s death. Now, while it is obvious that Ness wouldn’t have incriminated himself and would’ve simply lied about his role in Nitti’s death, a couple lines of dialogue which actually dealt with this would’ve been much better, since the film makes it seem like the trial resumed IMMEDIATELY after the whole Nitti fiasco, and that Ness was never interrogated about the events that transpired during the chase on the rooftop.

• Near the end of the film, the “So much violence” dialogue from Ness felt very on-the-nose, and was unintentionally funny.

THE POSITIVES—:

• Although it lacked originality, Ness’s character arc - an uptight textbook-following officer who, through an older, wiser and experienced father figure,  learns to bend the rules a little to bring deadly gangsters to justice - was still pretty decently written and was engaging to watch.

• Everyone in the cast gave a good performance, with Sean Connery proving to be the heart of the film and stealing every scene he was in, along with Robert De Niro as Al Capone.

• The cinematography and sound design were both excellent and they immensely helped in elevating the overall presentation of the story. 

• The film was also incredibly well paced, thanks to a very tight screenplay which didn't waste a single moment. The writers did a great job at balancing and evenly spreading moments of drama, action, thrill and humor, and making the film feel thematically complete, all in just under a two-hour runtime.

RATING-: 6/10