#widows review

[allthefilmsiveseenforfree]

Widows

Between this and Ocean’s 8 I think my new favorite microgenre of movies is female-centric heist films. Except where Ocean’s 8 just makes me want to eat brunch and be gay and do crimes, this movie makes me want to burn the fucking patriarchy to the ground and dance naked around the flames. And also be gay. That’s probably my own issue. A film of this pedigree - Steve McQueen directing and also co-writing with the unstoppable Gillian Flynn, starring Viola Davis - feels like a recipe for success, but is it anything more than just some kickass ladies stealing shit? Well...

Y’all, it’s not even ABOUT the heist. It’s about Viola Davis, Michelle Rodriguez, Elizabeth Debicki, and Cynthia Erivo embodying women who are trying to take control of their own lives. Women who are learning what it means to define themselves, rather than to be defined by the men they are with. Their husbands die in a heist, and they’re left to pick up the pieces - and repay those husbands’ debts, lest they get some more threatening visits from the Mannings (Daniel Kaluuya and Brian Tyree Henry). When Veronica (Viola Davis) discovers the plans for her late husband’s (Liam Neeson) next job, she gathers the widows together to pull off the job themselves and pay off the men threatening their lives. But as in all heists, there are some twists and turns along the way, and some next level suspense as they attempt to pull off the seemingly impossible.

Some thoughts:

So I have this problem where I kind of hate Michelle Rodriguez because her face like...never moves? Which feels like it should be the very first prerequisite required to be an actress, but what do I know. Anyway, the good news is that I hate her much less in this than anything else I’ve ever seen her in.

I love that each of the women get to be shown using their own experiences and skill sets to try to pull off the subterfuge. Linda (Michelle Rodriguez) speaks Spanish to another Latina woman when she’s trying to get information. “It’s my first week of work and my boss...” and the woman helps her, just like that. Because women have to stick together. Alice (Elizabeth Debicki) makes up a story about being a mail-order bride, complete with tears and rapid Polish-speaking, to get a woman at a gun show to help her purchase the guns for the job. And Veronica uses her appearance of wealth and status to infiltrate their heist location with ease. The only reason this scheme even gets off the ground is because of women helping other women at every turn.

That’s probably because every single man in this movie is untrustworthy, and his power corrupts (with the exception of one: Bash, the driver (Garret Dillahunt), did nothing wrong). Chicago politicians? Cronyism and bribes. First-time candidates for political office? Gang members and brutalizers. Nice guy john who’s paying Alice for sex? Dismissive and incapable of treating her as anything more than an object. DEATH TO THE PATRIARCHY Y’ALL.

This little white fluffy dog (who also starred in Game Night, so that’s some Meryl Streep-levels of range) is very cute but also so yappy how do criminals do crime shit when they’re carrying the loudest dog to ever exist? Also, just so everyone knows, there is a scene of brief but intense dog peril, but the dog is not harmed, I repeat, the dog survives the movie unharmed.

Steve McQueen’s directing means that not only is the pacing an exquisite slow burn, but each moment of increasing tension is also so visually beautiful to watch. Veronica wears a ton of white, and the juxtaposition between her posh, sleek white apartment and the grim darkness of the warehouse and alleys where they’re planning their crimes is an unsubtle, but effective, representation of these different worlds colliding.

A very special shout-out goes to Brian Tyree Henry and especially Daniel Kaluuya as his brother and enforcer. Kaluuya is on some next-level terrifying here, as his huge eyes stay cold and reptilian while terrorizing folks who have done his brother wrong. I can’t remember the last time I’ve been so afraid of a regular dude just standing still in a movie - maybe Javier Bardem in No Country For Old Men?

Robert Duvall, playing the literal patriarch of a political dynasty in Chicago, says an incredible line about politics, but really it’s about everything: “You think you’re going to change anything? You won’t change anything. We can’t change anything; all we can do is SURVIVE. And we do that by staying in power.” Does that not explain everything about our society in a nutshell? I got chills.

Most importantly, though, these women are doing what Duvall and his son (an oily and entitled Colin Farrell) claim they’re doing to support their corner of Chicago - supporting WOC by investing in businesses, or running a small business, or rebuilding a school library - and that’s the difference. Men talk. Women do.

At first I was a bit disappointed that the film forced Viola Davis to portray Veronica as so hard, to the point of being cold and unfeeling. There’s a long cultural (racist) legacy of portraying black women as emotionless, or the strong silent type who never show their suffering. But at the very end, when Veronica runs into Alice and smiles, I was trying to figure out why the movie would end this way; why would the final shot be her smiling face? And it hit me. It’s because Veronica is only cold and ruthless when navigating her husband’s world - when she is finally out from under that weight, and living life on her own terms, she is free to express herself. She’s taken control of her own life for the first time in years, and it looks radiant on her.

This movie is like Ocean’s 8 covered in kerosene and set on fire. Whether you care about heists or not, see it.

[agentnico]

Widows (2018) Review

Shows how much actors want to work with the legendary Steve McQueen! Even smaller roles are played by well known actors, like Jon Bernthal, Carrie Coon, Robert Duvall and even Liam Nesson. People love the McQueen! Ka-chow!!

Plot: Set in contemporary Chicago, amidst a time of turmoil, four women with nothing in common except a debt left behind by their dead husbands' criminal activities, take fate into their own hands, and conspire to forge a future on their own terms.

So after the enduring experience of 12 Years A Slave, Steve McQueen returns to direct....a partial remake of an 80s TV drama? Oh. But no, this isn’t just another generic action heist film, and the reason for this is literally Steve McQueen. In most heist films the heist itself is usually the best part, which is okay, because that’s why the audience have come to see the movie.  However McQueen decides to focus more on the build-up to the heist, and use that as an underlining for his message about everyday corruption, and how people learn to move on and rebuild within our broken society. Our leads are these women who have been defied by their husbands’ actions most of their lives for better or for worse, and them then finding themselves through, of all things, the heist. McQueen thematically manages to cover a lot, from sexism, race relations, violence, entitled privileges, politics... the list goes on. It can be quite a difficult watch, as its not one where you can switch off your brain and just relax. This is an intricate story where you have to focus to capture all the details, with every character so well written that each of them could hypothetically have their own movie. The difficulty of watching this film mainly comes thanks to how far McQueen is willing to go to present his themes, with certain scenes being quite raw and in-yer-face at times, though thanks to yet another solid script from Gone Girl screenwriter Gillian Flynn, the characters are given a lot of subtle humour and sharp witted dialogue that makes the film at times very fun to watch. This too is accompanied by exhilarating action sequences, especially when the heist is going down. The opening scene alone in the film throws you right into the action, with the husbands on their final job that ends quite deadly for them, and this first heist keeps inter-cutting with flashbacks of the husbands with their wives, managing to introduce the characters and their relations very powerfully whilst also managing to bring the tension with the heist. So for a very thematically dark and serious film Widows does offer moments of levity and excitement for the mainstream viewer, but for me it was the character study and the darker grittier moments stood out.

The cast assembled is one to behold. Every cast member gives it their all, no matter how short or major their part is, thus you can say that everyone steals the show, so different audience members will have their preferences. I’m not going to talk about all of the cast, as else will be here for quite a while, so I’ll mention those that stood out to me personally. Viola Davis as the leading widow brings it her all, having the ability to powerfully command every scene that she is in, whilst also managing at times to convey emotions of heartbreak and mourning quite subtly, as her character does not really like to show off any side of weakness to others. Elizabeth Debicki as one of the other widows portrays a woman that has been abused by everyone, her husband, mother, partners, everyone, and how she finally gets the chance to free herself from this liberation, or at least show promise that eventually in the future she will become a strong female figure. Then there is Daniel Kaluuya who may arguably be THE stand out of this film, playing very much against type from the roles he played previously with this villain full of toxic menace who brings tension to every scene (a scene involving a rapping duo is especially memorable), and the intensity and psychopathic power that brooms within his eyes is one to behold. The rest of the cast is great too, with maybe only Michelle Rodriguez feeling a bit out of place, though I do give her props, even she seemed to step up her game from her usual B-movie standard.

Widows is a gritty thriller that pull you in and never lets you go. There are parts that are slightly ludicrous in favour of making the action and the heist more exciting (this is a film after all), but thanks to its political and feminist statements, Widows easily stands out as one of the best films of 2018.

Overall score: 8/10

[influxmagonline]

'Widows' (2018) Review: Those Who Play By The Rules Often Get Screwed

By: Steve Pulaski Stylish, tense, and melancholic, Steve McQueen's Widows initially had me worried it would succumb to the weaker tendencies of...

'Widows' (2018) Review: Those Who Play By The Rules Often Get Screwed

[adamwatchesmovies]

Widows (2018)

Widows is one of the year's best. Filled with terrific characters brought to life by strong performances and packed with tension, this story reinvigorates the heist genre. It’s one not to miss.

Professional thief Harry Rawlings (Liam Neeson) and his partners are killed during a robbery. Now crime boss Jamal Manning (Brian Tyree Henry) demands Harry's widow, Veronica (Viola Davis) reimburse him. In her late husband’s notebook, she finds the plans for his next heist and enlists the help of the other widows – Linda (Michelle Rodriguez) and Alice (Elizabeth Debicki) – to pull it off.

What makes this picture so gripping is that plan Veronica has found. It's the means to steal $5 million – more than enough – the question is, can she find people skilled, and desperate enough to make it happen? The inherent risks are intensified, as the man who cooked it up was an expert assuming he’d be working with experienced colleagues. Until today, Veronica was happily turning a blind eye towards her husband. Now she wishes she hadn't. The women she enlists are as desperate as she, perhaps even more but if anything, their increasingly dire situations are likely to seep into the job and collapse it. These women aren’t prepared to handle someone like Manning, much less his brother, Jatemme (Daniel Kaluuya). He’s the kind of villain I’ve been dying to see. Not an ounce of kindness can be found in his eyes and he’s got a cruel streak that makes him instantly despicable but so imposing you don’t know if anyone could stand up to him… and live.

You have no idea what's coming up next, as there is much more going on than just the $5 million. In the women we explore different aspects of womanhood, sexism, and race. Then there's the upcoming alderman election. Frontrunner one is Jack Mulligan (Colin Farrell). He's a typical politician - far more interested in lining his pockets with side deals than anyone else. His biggest opponent? Manning, who is looking to break out of the criminal life and become as “legit” as a man like him could be. Both are tied to Veronica’s former husband and their battle has a direct impact upon the heist and its players. Anything among all these people runs the risk of ruining everything.

If you can take a step back from the tension permeating every scene, you'll recognize the beautiful cinematography present. Only a talent like director Steve McQueen would think of shooting Viola Davis like this. You can tell the utmost care has been placed in every frame and plot point and the performers seem to have realized this too, as they all deliver their best.

There's so much more to say about Widows but you can save me the trouble of trying to find the words by going to see it right now. (Theatrical version on the big screen, November 17, 2018)