There is something about dapper gangsters and the perils of organized crime that so mystically captivates the collective American imagination. For years, filmmakers have returned to this sensational subject matter, in turn, producing some of the greatest content to grace screens both silver and small. “The Godfather,” “The Sopranos”— popular culture in the land of the free is forever indebted to sleazy criminals living out their warped interpretations of the American dream. From this obsessive fixation with scoundrels and snakes emerges writer-director J.C. Chandor’s “A Most Violent Year,” a more than solid entry in a long line of crook-centric films and a refreshingly visionary evaluation of what it really means to make it in America.
Abel Morales, played in earnest by a remarkable Oscar Isaac (“Inside Llewyn Davis”), is dedicated to proving he’s not a thug. Having purchased a natural gas company from his low life of a father-in-law, Abel seeks to distinguish himself from his roguish competitors, prompting him to enter into negotiations with an elderly Hassid. Here, he strives to broker a deal with the power to make — or break — his career. Abel has ambition, and although he’s willing to ignore a few rules every now and again, he’s a respectable man with no inclination to taint his hard-earned reputation.
Unfortunately, with violence reaching new heights in the bustling metropolis of New York — beautifully accentuated by a palette of hot reds and sultry oranges — Mr. Morales finds himself at a curious junction. One of his many adversaries has started robbing his trucks at gunpoint and, as the threat permeates outward, ultimately encroaching upon his domestic existence, Abel must choose to fight back and jeopardize his all-important deal or stay clean and risk the loss of his personal and professional clout. The choice is near impossible. As a muckraking district attorney (David Oyelowo) begins to crack down on his finances, Abel finds himself on thin ice on all fronts.
But as tensions rise, Chandor keeps his cool, repressing anything that could endanger his muted aesthetic. This is a quieter, more introspective gangster film, and Chandor intends to keep it that way. For the vast majority of this tidy little flick, Chandor and cinematographer Bradford Young stick to tightly framed images — all accompanied by a hushed, synth-based score from Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zero’s frontman, Alex Ebert — with most of the dynamism carried in the power of the truly extraordinary performances of Isaac and company. And although Chandor occasionally peppers the screen with a handful of utterly breathtaking tracking shots — his forte — it is clear that he would simply rather take his time and let things fester.
It’s not that “A Most Violent Year” is a particularly slow film — quite the opposite, in fact — it’s simply that Chandor has no desire to throw down his best hand too early in the game. Instead, the young filmmaker allows each scene to build on its predecessor, while subtle, almost imperceptible, escalations ratchet up the tension with each change in scenery. By the time the film returns to the location of its opening sequence, it’s physically startling how much Abel’s seemingly straightforward business plan has wandered astray. As things collapse all around poor Abel, Chandor slowly chips away at you, and by the time the film arrives at its electrifying climax, you’ll be begging for the shattered man’s absolution.
Moreover, Jessica Chastain (“Zero Dark Thiry”), who has been doing magnificent work of late, delivers her career-best performance as Abel’s manipulative wife Anna (I’ve never seen such naked attention given to one’s fingers as instruments of expression). Decked out in a wardrobe of Armani, rivaled only in ostentation by her horrendous bangs, Chastain reigns over “A Most Violent Year” like a queen atop her much deserved throne. Wives in gangster movies tend to receive paltry attention — I’m still sore about Diane Keaton’s heinous treatment in “The Godfather: Part II” — but Chastain’s Anna, like a modern Lady Macbeth, is a character who simply refuses to be marginalized. Whether utilizing her husband as a pawn in her pursuit of prosperity or rejecting his protestations with some of the greatest one-liners in recent memory (“It wasn’t your good luck helping you out all these years, it was me!”), Chastain’s Anna brings life to an age-old genre.
This originality is the ultimate, and laudable, success of J.C. Chandor’s “A Most Violent Year,” a gangster film that is more interested in character and cogitation than it is in shoot-outs and fist-fights. Chandor would merely prefer to track the path of a tear down one woman’s porcelain cheek than to watch, from a distance, as wayward bullets riddle the soon-to-be-corpses of criminals in pinstripes. Despite what the title might suggest, “A Most Violent Year” is a gangster film that values ethical thugs and wives with determination, over senseless, and often unnecessary, violence. Although this approach represents a risky move on Chandor’s behalf, the bet, ultimately, pays off. In Chandor’s competent hands, America’s fascination breathes anew.
Contact Will Ferrer at wferrer ‘at’ stanford.edu.