Widows

This movie wasn’t exactly what I thought it was going to be.  I thought it was going to be a revenge movie about a bunch of widows who get back at some baddies who apparently killed their husbands after a botched heist. I was way off!  What ‘Widows’ turned out to be is a complicated character-driven movie with a few well turned plot twists. Viola Davis plays Veronica Rawlins, married to career criminal Harry Rawlins (played by Liam Neeson). He was the mastermind who planned a number of successful heists, and took care of everything…until this one went wrong. He and his henchmen are killed, leaving their wives not only alone, but out of home and a living, In the meantime, Colin Farrell’s character is running the usual duplicious campaign for alderman against a local black community leader, Jamal Manning (Brian Tyree Henry), who is also a crook.  His brother, played by Daniel Kaluuya of ‘Get Out’ comes after Veronica and the other widows. It seems the money Liam Neesen may have stolen was Jamal’s.  He needs the money to win the elction over Colin Ferrell.  He is not ready to give the widows any mercy, and the pressure is on.  Everyone in this movie has a secret, and no one is wholy innocent.  But the most noble characters appear to be the widows, who are forced to perform a robbery in order to save their lives and families.  It is rare that a movie of this genre plays out with well-developed characters. It is not just another cops and robbers movie.  It has a very film noir feel to it.  If you are looking for a very adult movie, that is definitely not a happy holiday movie, you may want to check it out.