10 Shocking Movie Deaths That Came Out Of NOWHERE

2. Billy Costigan - The Departed

The Departed is a thoroughly entertaining crime thriller, though a long way from Martin Scorsese's best film, and it does a consistently great job of killing off its characters in surprising ways. Best of all, Scorsese ingeniously killed off the movie's lead character. 

After undercover cop Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) has, at long last, captured police mole Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon), it looks as though he's finally won. No such luck. They're going down in the lift, the doors open and BANG! Costigan is shot in the head with gory results and falls down dead. 

The masterstroke here was filming entirely from in front. There's no warning whatsoever that there's a shooter there until the fatal gunshot and it will make everybody jump. Furthermore, the shooter is a minor police character (James Badge Dale) who viewers had probably forgotten about, so the reveal that he's another police mole makes all of this even more startling. Throughout his amazing career, DiCaprio has died quite a few times - this gem of a shock death is easily his finest on-screen demise to date.