The king of South Boston

Johnny Depp in a scene from "Black Mass." Image courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures.

People still speak of James “Whitey” Bulger in hushed tones around Boston, even though his presence as a crime lord in Southie ended decades ago. He remains one of those rare larger-than-life figures, the type of person who commands that brilliant blend of respect and outright fear along the broken-down streets of a community in constant need of resurrection. 

A popular search term via Google is "Southie Boston rough."

“Black Mass,” the biopic about Bulger’s life, certainly offers plenty of examples as to why the denizens of Southie would fear Bulger, but it never gets around to explain how the man endeared himself to the community, at least enough to warrant its protection. That's truly to the film's detriment, as a movie purportedly about the rise and fall of one of the city's most notorious and flamboyant criminal figures really should focus on what the man means to the community that raised him, and the one he actively terrorized for two decades. 

The who of Whitey Bulger is revealed through the use of some mild pop psychology, statements from former flunkies, and whatever one receives from Johnny Depp's performance (more on him in a bit). “Black Mass” doesn't reveal Bulger to be a man of many multitudes; rather, the film depicts him as a person who follows a flexible moral code in which loyalty to him matters above all. He can dole it out a little, at least to his younger brother and state senator Billy (Benedict Cumberbatch) and his beloved mother (Mary Klug), but he expects it in spades from his Winter Hill Gang (Jesse Plemmons, Rory Cochran and W. Earl Brown, among others), and from his girlfriend Lindsey (Dakota Johnson, who is in the film for around five minutes). 

He certainly demands it from FBI agent and sycophant John Connolly (Joel Edgerton), who convinces his FBI bosses and cohorts (Adam Scott, Kevin Bacon and David Harbour) to use Depp's Bulger as an informant against the Italian mafia. Sure, the information helps Depp's Bulger in the long run – the enemy of my enemy and so on – but Edgerton impresses the bosses for a spell and earns a spot in his idol's good graces. They term the agreement an alliance, although the details favor Depp’s Bulger more than Edgerton; the crime lord expands his empire beyond Southie and outright murders people during his two decades working with the FBI.

Depp, whose physical resemblance to Bulger is on par with a New Yorker cartoon, plays the man with intensity and verve, hiding his wickedness and murderous nature behind a crocodile smile, minor grotesqueness, and a cool leather jacket akin. Depp is cold, calculating and committed to his role, and he employs his inherent creepiness and uncommon charm to provide a little peak into the mind of a monster. This is a very, very good performance from a man who is capable of drawing great performances from rather strange places. 

For example.

And yet Depp is the wrong person for this role. The aforementioned creepiness Depp possesses doesn't stem from a place of malice – he's more akin to an alien learning about the planet around – which is vital for a character as explosive as Bulger. There's simply no menace to Depp's performance, just as there’s little sense of it in the film.

“Black Mass” talks a lot about Bulger, discusses his murders, his control of the drug trade in Southie, and about his criminal empire in general. The first of those three is shown repeatedly (it almost becomes a fact of life to watch Bulger take someone out), but the movie is uninterested in getting into the nitty gritty of his operation, about how the man rose to power, and how he garnered enough loyalty to build a his massive criminal operation. “Black Mass” never even shows Depp's Bulger broadening his empire; the idea is, once again, talked about but never actually shown.

There's much too much talk in “Black Mass,” far more said than shown and far too many voices inserted into the film's machinations. Is the story about Bulger, or is it about Bulger’s effect on the people around him? Or perhaps it’s about how one’s morality can slip so easily, or how a boogeyman is formed. Is Bulger a romantic figure, a monster, a man who loses touch his humanity, or a warning on what power can do to the human soul? “Black Mass” isn’t sure how to portray Bulger on screen, and the result is a muddled story that fails to capture the man’s dirty legacy.

Review: Two and a half out of Five Stars

Click here to see the trailer.

Rating: R

Run time: 122 minutes

Genre: Biopic

Ask Away

Target audience: People in the mood for a lot of violence, very little sex, and Johnny Depp with some terrible teeth.

Take the whole family?: “Black Mass” contains about all of the murders, so definitely not.

Theater or Netflix?: It might get some academy award buzz, so a matinee trip to see what the fuss is about won't hurt.

Johnny Depp, Oscar winner?:  I have a sneaking suspicion he'll sneak into the final five for best actor (Oscar prediction sites have him as a contender), but I don't think he'll win the award. Depp will lose to a performance that's a little more Oscar befitting (one that pops up frequently is Eddie Redmayne in “The Danish Girl”) or perhaps to someone like Leonardo DiCaprio, who has come ever so close to winning one and is theoretically due for an award.

Watch this as well?: I seriously, seriously wish Martin Scorsese directed this film, so I'm going to recommend revisiting older flicks like “Goodfellas” and “Mean Streets,” along with “The Departed” (Jack Nicholson's crime boss is based on Whitey Bulger) and “The Wolf of Wall Street.”

One of the few moments in the film in which Leonardo DiCaprio isn't acting bananas.