What was so great about A Most Violent Year?

i mean, even the title sounds so self important. i should have known.

and i love jc chandor, this is especially heart breaking for me. i thought we might be seeing another top tier director blossoming based on reviews i'd read.

I was a big fan of Margin Call and All is Lost. Everything about this flick felt silly. Everyone felt like a caricature. It was almost like a parody of mafia movies, except the stakes were a lot lower.

+ why is everything reliant on klutzes dropping their guns all the time? I don't get it.

Also, I'm back hoes. Hope you guys didn't miss me too much.

IDK, I never saw the flick. Not plying in my local theaters.

__________________
Fear and Loathing in MoFo... The Gunslinger 45's Top 50 Favorite Films

In the 10 Ring: Gunslinger45's reviews

Hey Shaq, is that your girlfriend in your pocket or are you just excited to see me?

my friend's a member of the academy. watched it before it was out in theaters.

get mad

Nah. To be honest it was never on my radar to watch. Now if you were to ask me why people think The Theory of Everything is so good we could have a discussion. I thought that was dull Oscar bait.

It was dull Oscar bait.

What can we fight about then?

Kobe?

I kid. Then again when I was into basketball I was a Bulls fan.

bump now that i'd assume more people have seen it

Here is my review. For reference's sake, I also have Margin Call at and have not seen All is Lost.

__________________
Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

I also wasn't impressed by A Most Violent Year. I compare it to the 2003 Hulk movie. How much fun can you have watching a character that has no interest in being in their own movie? The whole story is about people who don't want to do anything cinematic or interesting. There is a great story to me told about crime in NYC back then, but we focus on a couple that deals with mundane problems and avoids crime.

That's a bit uncharitable. I reckon it does have a theoretically interesting premise about how Isaac's character wants to stay legitimate in a business that attracts a lot of organised crime and how difficult circumstances threaten to make him give in and resort to criminal behaviour, to say nothing of the conflict that causes as Oyelowo's character is investigating him for any possible criminal behaviour. Then there's the conflict it causes with Chastain's character as she also encourages him to go crooked less out of greed and more out of concern for the family's well-being, especially when things such as a loaded gun or a home-invader show up (which is hardly a "mundane" problem). It's not like the film completely lacks for cinematic sequences, it just chooses to use them sparingly. I do grant that the scene where Isaac chases someone in a French Connection-style sequence is probably the high point of a film where the focus is clearly elsewhere, but I appreciate the balance more so than the non-stop talking of Chandor's earlier Margin Call.

You're right, it doesn't completely lack them, there's not not nearly as much as I would like. It has merit, and the performances are all great whether they're doing anything interesting or not. On the whole, I thought there was more bad than good, and your 3 star rating says that you leaned slightly the opposite way, but not by much.

I don't know why I liked it, but I did. At least it was a normal story. There was some melodrama that I didn't care for, but on the whole, it was just a believable story. So many movies try to jam lessons down your throat, or superheroes or aliens or ghosts down your throat, that at some level I felt like I'd just read a nice book, not a great book, but just a good read.

I wasn't a big fan of Chandor's All is lost.