r/flicks • u/screen_stack • 5d ago
Review The Untouchables (1987)
The Untouchables (1987)
Rating: 9.5/10
Watched: October 6, 2026
One of the coolest things about being born in the 70s is being able to catch someone either early on in their careers or at the very beginning of it. In the case of Kevin Costner, the first movie I saw him in was Silverado in 85, and he's one of those actors that I actually got to grow up with.
Which is just great. Why do I bring this up? Because it's phenomenal to see an actor like Kevin Costner's career undergo a truly impressive transformation, pretty much hot on the heels of Silverado. From about '85 to the mid-2000s, our 'working man actor' regularly produced superb movies and The Untouchables is one of the crown jewels.
Another historical retelling similar in vein to The Right Stuff in that they took liberties here and there with the storytelling to make it more lurid or more exciting or dramatic, it was awesome to watch this one again after having not seen it for at least 25 years.
If you've seen The Untouchables, I'm sure I'd be preaching to the choir if I talked about Connery's cantankerous Jim Malone or Costner's somewhat milquetoast-esque Eliot Ness or De Niro's Al Capone or even a fresh-faced Andy Garcia as George Stone.
All those conversations are worth having because each man plays their role (as far as I feel) the way they should be played. I've already confessed to not being a historian in any real sense, but I reckon that The Untouchables wouldn't have been the enormous hit it was back then if it'd been too inaccurate or over-the-top.
The interesting thing about rewatching movies I haven't seen in a very long time, especially during these challenges and being 54 is that sometimes I gravitate away from where the camera wants me to look. I appreciated Connery as always. Same with Costner and De Niro.
But after a lifetime of watching movies, it's nice to catch sight of 'that guy' Billy Drago as Nitti. You need a great actor to play someone you can just look at and go 'that guy's evil and nasty', Billy Drago was your 80s and 90s go-to for villainy. Like most actors who play murderers and fiends, by all accounts, Billy was one helluva nice guy and I'm not surprised by it. The best dramatic actors are comedians, so it makes sense that the best bad guys are total sweethearts.
This time, though, my attention was on nebbish Charles Martin Smith as Oscar Wallace. Another 'hey it's that guy' actors, Oscar's the guy who comes with the idea to nab Capone on tax evasion, and almost from the very damn beginning of the movie. It absolutely surprised me that they rolled it out that quickly. For some reason I always thought that was a mid-movie reveal.
The reason I focused on Oscar Wallace is because he's an accountant. That was his thing. But the moment Malone put a shotgun in his hands and said 'we're going on a raid', Oscar Wallace (at least in the movie) didn't hesitate. He grabbed that shotgun and did his damnedest. Later in the film, he becomes, for a very brief moment, an actual goddamn action hero on that bridge connecting The US to Canada.
And that was cool as hell. Yelling, firing his shotgun, not stopping unless it's to take a quick sip of illegal hooch? That's some damn fine acting and some for-real-deal heroism from where I sit.
If you somehow haven't seen the movie, I won't say any more about Oscar Wallace except that he was a real damn hero, the kind of guy a guy like me could imagine being. Not the power fantasy Jack Reacher kind of guy who bitch slaps enemies left, right and center. The kind of guy who gets handed a shotgun and is basically asked to do his best, and then goes on and does his best.
If you have seen the movie, I'm pretty sure you know what I'm talking about. The Untouchables is full of massive star power displaying huge degrees of talent and skill, but here's Charles Martin Smith, quietly doing the real work that brought down the Chicago mob boss Al Capone. I like to imagine that the real Oscar Wallace felt invigorated by the new challenges he faced working with Ness and the others.
The Untouchables were real people who fought a real gangster organization, and this movie does a great job of showing us that. Under normal circumstances, I'd regret having waited a quarter-century to revisit this exceptional classic, but like I always say:
Younger Me would've still appreciated a masterclass movie, but Older Me loves the nuance.
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u/Ok-Lavishness-7904 5d ago
Brilliant movie. The train station scene is phenomenal. If you haven’t seen Costner in Fandango, I highly recommend
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u/Stereo_Jungle_Child 5d ago
The train station scene is phenomenal.
I loved the nod to "Battleship Potemkin" in that scene.
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u/Fresh-March2422 5d ago
man i got something in my eye during that bridge scene, charles martin smith going from desk guy to full action mode is so good. billy drago face always gave me nightmares as kid too
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u/Restless_spirit88 5d ago
I say this is a good film but not a great one but still, quite entertaining. Sean Connery steals the show.
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u/calguy1955 5d ago
His first interaction with Andy Garcia is priceless, as is his interrogation of the “prisoner”.
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u/calguy1955 5d ago
If you liked the Charles Martin Smith character you should watch Hell is for Heroes. It’s got a stellar cast led by Steve McQueen but a young Bob Newhart as a young army paper pusher thrust into battle is great.
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u/atombomb1976 4d ago
The main problem is that Drago's portrayal of Frank Nitti, while entertaining, was the complete and exact opposite of who Nitti actually was.
He also didn't die from falling off a building. It was much later, and it was both more tragic and more mundane.
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u/screen_stack 4d ago
Yeah i read that. I understand why they wanted a more satisfying ending for Nitti, because beebee l vengeance must be had but yeah
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