I enjoy listening to musical scores in movies, so I was eager to hear Martin Scorsese’s new gangster epic “The Departed.”

I figured we’d have haunting music like that found in Nino Rota’s “Godfather” or Ennio Morricone’s “Once Upon a time in America.”

I anticipated that composer Howard Shore, who also wrote the score for Scorsese’s “Gangs of New York,” would adapt the moody style of his “Lord of the Rings” to accent the latest Scorsese crime drama.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I heard a score whose two most memorable themes were Patsy Cline’s country Western classic “Sweet Dreams” and the percussive beeps of a cell phone.

When Patsy croons, “Why can’t I forget you and start my life anew instead of having sweet dreams about you,” somebody’s usually lying dead. The irony is amusing to us, but less so to the faithful departed, I suspect.

And when a gunfight at an abandoned warehouse looms, the silence is deafening — except for the beep of a cell phone, a sound that becomes a motif as time passes, and countless bodies fall limp. Apparently text messaging can’t block a bullet.

“The Departed” is a masterful film driven by a compelling unpredictable script. At its heart, “The Departed” is the tale of two moles, burrowing inside enemy territory.

One mole, Colin, is a mobster who has risen to a powerful place inside the police force. The other, Billy, is a detective who has risen to a trusted position inside the mob.

The story is like a symphony of mirrors: both men are so well trusted, that they are chosen as the ones to dig out the mole — a tricky job that requires hiding their own identity while pinning blame elsewhere. And, the coup de grace: both men soon realize their fates are intertwined.

Matt Damon, the fake cop, delivers a fine performance, one that is slightly stronger than Leonardo DiCaprio’s portrayal of the fake mobster. Try as he might, Leonardo just can’t muster up the darkness and depth needed here.

But the film revolves around Jack Nicholson, who has never looked worse, but has seldom been better. Nicholson plays the cold-blooded gangster Frank Costello with his patented smirk.

“I don’t want to be a product of my environment,” says Frank, in the narration. “I want my environment to be a product of me.”

For Frank/Jack, life’s a joke, interrupted by occasional bullets to the head of those who don’t laugh. He really doesn’t mean to upset you when he kills you — deepest apologies.

There were times when I could see the Joker from Tim Burton’s “Batman” in this performance and other times when Nicholson came perilously close to becoming a parody of himself.

But Jack seems to know when his toes are dangling over the cliff and deftly steps backwards. Just when we think he’s laughing, he starts killing — again.

The perennial question, of course, is whether Scorsese will ever win a Best Picture Oscar. Every new Scorsese film immediately sets off Oscar talk.

Already critics are divided on whether “Departed” is Oscar-worthy or just worthy.

The two major critic Web sites have anointed it with 88 percent (Metacritic) and 92 percent (Rotten Tomatoes) ratings. Those are astronomical scores, by the way.

One gets the sense, as the movie unfolds, that Scorsese is tired of making self-conscious movies in pursuit of a statue. Instead, in “The Departed,” he seems to just wink at the Academy and let an impish devil-may-care spirit take over the craftsmanship.

The overt and covert comedy in “The Departed” provides the counterpoint to pointblank assassinations.

Nicholson’s smug smirks continue even while he’s contemplating killing his entire clan in order to purge the mole. That plan, by the way, reminded me in a perverse way of Bill Murray’s dynamiting of the golf course in pursuit of his overstuffed gopher in “Caddyshack.”

The black comedy inside “The Departed” is the film’s surprising signature.

The film’s glaring weakness is the preposterous “coincidental romances” that unite the two Mr. Moles with the same woman. The moles also seem a bit too “lucky,” as their shrewd colleagues conveniently overlook clues that really should have driven the rodents out of darkness and into daylight.

Does the corrupt cop really think he can text message Costello during a police briefing without being noticed?

And, finally, there are moments when I was wishing DiCaprio had gone down with the ship when the iceberg struck.

But somehow, despite these trifles, “The Departed” won me over — totally.

I just quit nitpicking, settled back into my chair and started smirking right along with Jack.

Every few minutes, Scorsese would wipe the smile off my face with an unsuspected bullet.

But even as the final overpaid actor breathed his final overpaid breath, I still came away more lighthearted, than disheartened.

The title “The Departed,” of course, refers loosely to the religious conviction that the faithful departed will wend their way to heaven, perhaps with the prayerful assistance of the friends they left behind. Sweet dreams.

Another view

By Peggy O'Neill

About halfway through “The Departed,” I just wanted it to be over — not because it was a bad movie. I just know things never end pleasantly in Martin Scorsese land, and at that particular moment I knew I was going to have to endure many more unpleasantries before the final unpleasantry. It was kind of like sitting through a performance review at work only Jack Nicholson is your boss and he’s pacing around the room with his arms inexplicably drenched in blood.

“The Departed” pits Matt Damon against Leonardo DiCaprio. Damon plays a cop named Colin Sullivan groomed by the Boston Irish mafia to manipulate the state police department into letting the thugs do evil things without being interrupted. DiCaprio plays another cop, Billy Costigan, working undercover in the same mob. He’s tortured by loneliness and two cell phones — one with a direct connection to the good guys, one with a direct connection to the bad guys.

If you’ve ever wondered what would happen if these two actors went head-to-head in a round of celebrity boxing, this movie suggests that it would be a double TKO — their performances were equally outstanding. If you threw Mark Wahlberg into the ring, however, he would be the last man standing. Wahlberg plays a supporting role, Sergeant Dignam, but he literally manages to punch his way to the top in every scene he’s in.

Jack Nicholson plays mob boss Frank Costello, who is evil incarnate. Costello recruits young boys to work for him, says inappropriate things to teenage girls and nuns, showers prostitutes in cocaine, steals microprocessors and oh, yeah, kills people. He does all this with a wicked grin, a greasy goatee and and a charm that somehow makes it all tolerable to watch. And he has that quality that makes even the greatest of moral flaws forgivable — a terrific sense of humor.

The story of these three men — Costello, Sullivan and Costigan — and how their lives are intertwined moves along so quickly and with such suspense, I didn’t remember the moment of anxiety I mentioned before until today. Things do get deliciously unpleasant in “The Departed,” but luckily those committing the unpleasantries are very accurate and get it done with a single shot — so gore is kept to a minimum.

Leaving the Cinemark Theater, I felt as though a great weight had been lifted. Sort of like when you think you’ll get fired during your performance review but you get a raise and promotion instead. Don’t get me wrong, “The Departed” is a not a feel-good movie in the traditional sense of the phrase. But it’s a good movie with good acting, good direction, a good story line and a satisfying, if unpleasant, ending.