Violence dominates Gangs

Long-awaited, Martin Scorsese's latest homage to his home town is set in the mid-19th century and turns out to be a colossal fresco of New York, teeming with life and rife with violence, that dwarfs the drama of its three stars. It's about the warring tribes of immigrants, the old Anglo-Saxon Protestants and the newly arrived Irish Catholics.

To both sects, violence comes naturally, and usually with sharp-edged weaponry - the amount of cutlery in the movie would supply several butchers' shops. It ends with a mammoth fight between the two that turns the snow red. pThe personal dramas centre on the battle of spirit and muscle between 'Bill The Butcher' (Daniel Day-Lewis in stovepipe hat and villain moustache) and Leonardo DiCaprio, as Amsterdam Vallon, out to avenge the murder of his father - and Cameron Diaz as a sexy pickpocket, caught between the two factions and lovers.

But the real drama is that of a city taking shape out of internecine warfare. Scorsese chronicles the riots arising out of the enforced enlistment of men for the Civil War, the shelling of New York by the Union Army and the gradual imposing of order (and corruption) on an unruly metropolis.

Gangs Of New York
Cert: 18