Black Mass—Movie Review

by Peter J. O'Connell

Black Mass. Released: Sept. 2015. Runtime: 

by Peter J. O'Connell

Black Mass. Released: Sept. 2015. Runtime: 122 mins. Rating: R for brutal violence, language throughout, some sexual references and brief drug use.

It used to be said of the wall-to-wall blue-collar, Irish Catholic neighborhood of South Boston that if a family there had two sons, one would become a priest or politician or professor or policeman, and one would become a criminal. The Bulger family of South Boston had three sons: one (William “Billy” Bulger) became a powerful politician; one (John “Jackie” Bulger) became an obscure magistrate; one (James “Whitey” Bulger) became an infamous criminal.

Now the film Black Mass, directed by Scott Cooper, tells the Whitey Bulger story—or at least part of it, the most notorious part, the part from the 1970s to the 1990s when Whitey (played by Johnny Depp) and the FBI worked together. This unholy alliance was forged by another South Boston product, FBI agent John Connolly (Joel Edgerton).

Connolly and Whitey had known each other in their younger days. Beginning in the 1970s, Connolly arranged for the FBI to look the other way regarding Whitey's crimes (which probably included at least 19 murders) in return for information that Whitey would provide on the local Mafia, based in the Italo-American North End neighborhood of Boston. The Mafia and Whitey's Winter Hill Gang were traditional enemies. Whitey's alliance with the FBI helped bring about a decline in the Mafia but a flourishing of the Winter Hill thugs.

Johnny Depp is riveting as Whitey—pale, black-clad, whispery-voiced, reptilian—as he leads his brutal lifestyle based on the deaths of others. But Depp is also moving in the few moments of humanity that the movie allows him, as when his young son dies. Joel Edgerton is excellent as Agent Connolly, always wearing a three-piece suit but emanating a thuggish aura himself. Most of the rest of the cast, including Dakota Johnson as Whitey's girlfriend and Julianne Nicholson as Connolly's wife, also deliver the goods, though Benedict Cumberbatch as Billy Bulger seems somewhat miscast, a touch    too elegant.

Black Mass, of course, shows the influence of Martin Scorsese's gangster films—how could it not? But Scott Cooper films in a more tightly compressed, almost claustrophobic, way than the more fluid Scorsese. Cooper's style is quite effective, though not as “epic” as the master's.

Then there is the question often asked about the spate of films in recent years set in Boston: “Is the accent handled well?” Here it's handled passably. Overall, as a denizen of Southie might say: “Drive to a theatah, pahk yoah kah, and see Black Mass. It's wicked good!” 

“Footnote” to the film: Today South Boston is rapidly gentrifying as young professionals of diverse backgrounds replace the traditional Irish Catholic working-class families.