REVIEW OF A MOST VIOLENT YEAR

2015 rating: **1/2

A famous line in the infamously dull GODFATHER PART III had Al Pacino shouting that no matter how he tries to get out, they keep pulling him back in… The opposite occurs in A MOST VIOLENT YEAR where real criminals are shoving a relatively honest bootlegger, with one week to purchase an important piece of land, out of business…

From his trucks being robbed to armed goons breaking into his mansion, Oscar Isaac’s Abel Morales is a man with a master plan who won’t let anything get in his way...

Oscar Isaac

With a solid helmet of dark slightly-graying hair, piercing eyes and an overall steely countenance, Issac has all the makings of an old school gangster the likes of Pacino, Robert DeNiro and the guy he somewhat resembles a leading man version of, Chazz Palminteri. Unfortunately the film, a two-hour collection of backroom meetings, conversations and confrontations, makes this potentially solid character less relevant and meaningful to the mob genre than even Andy Garcia in… the aforementioned disappointment.

Like any subtle crime melodrama that spends more time ticking than exploding, providing businesslike realism over pulpy gun play, the suspense is based on each word spoken: And Abel stands behind everything he says – in an otherwise good performance despite the limitations. Meanwhile his wife Anna, played by Jessica Chastain, remains on the sidelines despite having her own form of wily strength and edgy wisdom. What a team they could have made… But nothing really comes of their actions except random reactions, and with two truck robberies, a road chase and an ass-kicking aside, if this were A MOST VIOLENT YEAR, we missed most of it. OVERALL RANK: Jedi, Rebel, Droid, Sith.