Director: Brian De Palma
Writers: David Mamet (screenplay), Oscar Fraley (book), Eliot Ness (book)
Stars: Kevin Costner, Sean Connery, Robert De Niro, Andy Garcia

This review is part of the feature:

The 33 Gangster Films You Can’t Refuse

In the 1970’s, Francis Ford Coppola reinvented the Gangster genre with his two brilliant The Godfather movies. In the 1990s, Martin Scorsese reinvented the genre again with his masterful GoodFellas and Casino. The 1980’s belonged to Brian De Palma who delivered two absolute classics to the gangster genre that decade: Scarface (1982) and The Untouchables (1987).

The Untouchables was originally a successful television series in the sixties in which treasury agent Elliot Ness took on Al Capone and other famous American criminals in the prohibition era. The villains in this show were always deliciously cast and over the top, while the G-men were pretty boring. De Palma prevented this by creating a memorable government team featuring strong performances by Kevin Costner, Andy Garcia, Charles Martin Smith and an Oscar winning Sean Connery. Still, De Niro steals the show as Al Capone. Typical of the actor, he really becomes the hot headed gangster in his performance.

The movie is set up as a typical cop versus robber story, with the gangsters being framed as pure evil in the beginning when they blow up a bar and kill a young girl in the process. De Palma takes mob violence to a next level here. The blood in The Untouchables is deep red and the amount of it spilled during several killings is shocking.

What makes this such a fantastic film is the many brilliantly executed sequences. Just one example is the suspenseful set piece at the train station in which Elliot Ness and Andy Garcia’s character try to apprehend Capone’s bookkeeper. Every shot is a little masterpiece in itself. This scene especially put De Palma in the same league as Hitchcock as an inventor of highly effective thrillers.

The epic score by Ennio Morricone and some pure poetry in the script by David Mamet ensure that this is the definitive film adaptation of the story of Al Capone and Elliot Ness.