Really don't know about this one. Why is Leonard Di Caprio J. Edgar Hoover? He already proved to be severely miscast in biopics before ("The Aviator"...please). "Catch Me If You Can"...good movie. Good performance. But why pick a guy with a boyish face to play someone who's supposed to fool people that he looks older? Ever see the real guy it was based on? He started having gray hair when he was in his 20's, that's what helped him con people. Bad casting.

And now...this is almost like Di Caprio just Kevin Costnering over everyone. Another bad accent ("Gangs of New York", "Blood Diamond" say hello).

And really...the movie looks absolutely boring. A lot of little mob scenes, darkly photographed...I don't know, Clint Eastwood seems to be sleepwalking lately with his films.

Another Oscar craving picture that looks like a tossaway tincan that will get more attention because it's Eastwood directing, Di Caprio acting (hoping he finally gets that Oscar he should've won 16 years ago)...I don't know. It looks bland.

I'll probably still go see it and give it a recommendation though (right, shakes?).

maybe they thought they could work around this by coloring his hair gray for the movie. i hear they can do that now.

Itll be good because Dicaprio is the best popular actor in the world right now.

Will he be wearing a dress?

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

oy...that's not what i mean. maybe you should learn a little about the real guy.

i know a thing or two about j edgar hoover. however, i do admit i never studied the color of his hair very carefully though. i hope they nail it in this picture.

MOFO, i was talking about "catch me if you can" when i was talking about the graying hair.

close enough

gotcha - and as a sidenote, based on that image, dicaprio makes a pretty fair hoover. not bad.

billy crudup was a perfect choice...it's just too bad he was already used in "public enemies".

di caprio's makeup doesn't look too flattering.

DiCaprio has had a weird career. His actiing choices and performances have become worse as he has become older. This Boy's Life, Gilbert Grape, and The Basketball Diaries were all quality performances. Since he became Scorcese's golden boy I haven't been impressed with any of his work. The Departed is one of the most overrated piles of movie shit in the last 20 years. I gave up on Shutter Island and Revolutionary Road about halfway through.

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Back off, Warchild. Seriously.

Departed was awesome.

He was like 12 when he "chose" This Boy's Life.

What about Gangs of New York, Catch me if you can and Titanic?

Decent choices?

They could have cast a trained chimp in the DiCaprio character in Titanic and that stupidass movie would have still been successful.

Fuck James Cameron (post T2)

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Yeah, I never made it thru the whole movie, but Id say it was a solid role to choose.

I liked Blood Diamond and Inception.

He is one of the actors I have been able to count on to deliver a good movie. Same with Eastwood as a director. This may not be earth shattering, but it will be better than 85% of movies that come out this year most likely.

yeah, that just shows how bad hollywood's gotten in the past few years.

it'll probably be your standard biopic. eastwood is a good director but i haven't been all that impressed with his more recent films.

+1

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"Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public." ~ H.L. Mencken

Gangs of New York was awful.

I thought he was great in Catch Me If You Can.

His best role is still the retarded brother in Gilbert Grape. I really thought he was retarded. There are a few people on here who play that role as well.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Frankly, I'm a little suprised Eastwood didn't go with early frontrunner Samuel L. Jackson for the role.

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I don't remember half the time if I'm hiding or I'm lost

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"gangs of new york" was extremely messy and di caprio was less than impressive in it. daniel day lewis held that movie together.

he was fine in "catch me if you can", i just didn't really understand why they chose a guy who looks younger than he is to play a guy who was mistaken for being older all the time.

"gilbert grape" and "basketball diaries" probably top my list. he was good in "marvin's room" and "this boy's life", and he was fucking awesome in his cameo in "celebrity".

and i liked him a lot in "shutter island" actually. "inception" did nothing for me.

Gangs of New York isn't terrible. It's completely over the top hammy thanks to Day-Lewis. Leo is just there more as a piece of scenery around DDL's rise and fall. I've never sat down and watched Titanic. Most I've seen out of that movie revolve around Kate Winslet's delicious curves. Catch Me If You Can is good. It's a fun film and I think he did well in his role.

W_Z, when in your opinion did Eastwood start mailing it in? After Mystic River?

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Back off, Warchild. Seriously.

i thought i replied to that question, zizou, but apparenty not. well, i think he still made some good films after "mystic river" but his last couple haven't been too great.

and you know what?

neither is this one!

actually, it's a bit of a missed opportunity. if you didn't know much about hoover before this film, you'd think he was a pretty sad but forgivable guy after seeing this. and really, the guy was just as much a criminal as the ones he caught. while he deserves credit for creating and legitimizing the federal bureau of investigation, he took a lot of liberties once he got more power. and that really isn't covered a whole lot in the film. it's also a little insulting that the final scene is meant to be a bit of a "ha-ha" moment when hoover's personal files are being shredded. if everybody has a file, so should edgar.

as a personal story, it is a bit of a triumph. after the first few jarring moments of hearing dicaprio strain for an old accented hoover, he settles into the role (and the horrendous make-up) and winds up giving one of his most powerful performances in years. his relationship with clyde tolson (brilliantly played by armie hammer) is well treated by screenwriter dustin lance black (who also penned "milk", a far superior film) but the professional story is really amiss. and there's always the question of why hoover is the way he is...it's not really explored except in a few confusing flashbacks to when he's a child. he has an intensely close relationship to his mother, too, and she really dictates him as a man. but he still has his own personal demons, especially when it comes to clyde. he does truly love him, but he doesn't want to risk the embarrassment of expressing it. tolson is portrayed much more willing to expose himself as in love with edgar, but edgar doesn't allow anything to happen...except in one scene, kind of.

The film didn't bore me; that was a pleasant surprise. I wasn't sure how much I actually wanted to know about hoover, and I still don't think I learned anything substantial or tangible because as i said before, the personal files were shredded. So there's a lot of speculation...maybe he wasn't even truly in love with tolson after all. He did fabricate a lot of his arrest stories and make himself out to be more heroic than he probably was.

Overall I just wanted more out of this picture. Once again, it's well photographed and the pace is fine by Eastwood (except the last 10 minutes have a few "is this over now?" moments) but Eastwood doesn't seem to figure Hoover out either, nor does he seem to care to. I don't know if that's really "mailing it in" but it's definitely not the kind of command he usually has over his films.

The make-up, like I said, is bad. Naomi Watts' isn't too horrible, but the WORST is Tolson's. It is absolutely horrendous. It looks so prosthetic it's almost like he's wearing a bad mask from Halloween. Hammer does as good a job as he can while inside but good Christ I just wonder...did anybody watch the dailies for this film? Or was the make-up like an after effect, not put in until post production?

Surprised and thoroughly enjoyed DiCaprio's performance. But the film really falls short of what it possibly could be, if they just had some info on the bastard.

out of (that's the equivalent of 2 1/2 stars, just to be clear)