Scorsese's latest film, The Departed centers around the struggle of an ordinary, successful businessman who discovers his business activities are the target of relentless government interference.

Frank Costello, played by an apparently overjoyed Jack Nicolson, is the victim of an elaborate scheme to undermine his liberty to practice business by a team of unscrupulous, double-dealing regulators.

The core of the film is a duel between two betrayers - Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon) and Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio), who between them spin a web of lies and deceit as they ritualistically play off the good-natured foibles of their clever yet all-too-trusting employer.

Tribute must be made to a fine performance by DiCaprio, who has come a long way from the effete pretty-boy who, for much of his acting life, inspired every man with an ounce of manliness in him to want for nothing more than the chance to beat him to a bloodied sack of pulp for being such a damned sissy! Indeed, DiCaprio has grown up in his thirties, and brings to the screen unprecedented upper-body strength, as well as a new capacity for facial hair. Bravo!

It is DiCaprio's genius that carries this film, as a tortured man without family, friends or life outside his own profession of secret treachery. He is a man struggling without a true self in the midst of turmoil, coping (barely) with a constant terror of being discovered and put to justice by his ill-used employer. DiCaprio abuses his employer's trust and evidences secret loathing of his colleagues with the sort of wishy-washy moralizing common among liberals; it is not for nothing that the story is set in the notoriously blue state of Massachusetts.

Sometimes DiCaprio's character carps about the awfulness of working alongside so-called 'murderers' - an obvious, broad hint to audiences that he symbolizes the many Democrats who are satisfied to have young men murder Iraqis in order to protect their freedoms, while they spout a lot of sanctimony and treasonous slander about their noble, yet all-too-trusting president.

DiCaprio's alter-ego, the more loyal but ultimately flawed Damon, shines as a clinical and methodical assistant to his patron, while undertaking the onerous task of working with the Massachusetts State Police. Damon works tirelessly to defend the business interests of his old friend Costello, dodging and weaving throughout a gripping cat-and-mouse game with goverment regulators. All Damon gets for his loyalty and efforts is a mere apartment in Beacon Hill with views of the gold domed State House.

But Damon's character portrayal is nonetheless undermined by the script's simplicity. Reprising his role as the deviant sociopath of The Talented Mr Ripley, it is unclear whether Damon's character even especially likes women very much. There are more than a few hints that he lacks sufficient virility to retain the interest of his girlfriend, a state psychologist who is forced to initiate a half-hearted affair with DiCaprio.

A bold move of Scorcese to cast Damon as a closet homosexual, but undoubtedly an attempt to reveal how wily and treacherous homosexuals ultimately are. Damon's character is otherwise, like DiCaprio's, a man without a 'self', and fulfills the role of a perfectly un-psychologized villain in the tradition of all good American movies.

Jack Nicolson's portrayal of a determined, unjustly betrayed business man deserves an award at the next round of film festivals. I hope in particular that he may be the recipient of "Best Performance by an Actor Immitating Jack Nicolson", an accolade that has been hogged by Christian Slater for more than a decade. Above all else, Nicholson is an actor who remains steadfastly loyal to who he is, unlike these other Hollywood radicals who can't seem to make up their mind exactly who they are, let alone to whom they are married.

This is a film that sends a clear and powerful message, and that is: the economy of this great nation of ours can prosper only with far less government interference and regulation. The results of misguided efforts to weaken and restrict American business leaders, as is the case of the Jack Nicolson's hero in The Departed, lead to tragic results.