Widows

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One way and the other I’d seen the trailer for ”Widows” twice before it actually opened and I was very interested. I didn’t care that Steve McQueen was the director of the much lauded “Twelve Years a Slave” because I hadn’t actually much liked it, considering that its positive reception had a lot more to do with political correctness than actual film-making excellence. (A stridently pro black anti-slavery film coming out at the crest of the “Black Lives Matter” movement was pretty assured of a good reception).

By contrast “Widows” promised a story that didn’t seem obviously top-heavy in political correctness (all the main characters *are* women, it’s true) but did promise both an adult storyline *and* Jacki Weaver – a woman who I’ve adored and respected since she was taking her first tiny steps into the industry, way back before I had been taught the sin of Onan, and since then she’s somehow managed to stay older than me, totally gorgeous, get even more talented, win an Academy Award and entice me into the rain to pay $16 to see a film…

Three women find themselves saddled with a very large debt to a gang boss. They can’t go to the police, they can’t get a loan from a bank.They are quite against the idea of dying. They resolve to steal the money they need.

Not to spoil the obvious – this being America, to do a robbery they need guns, and various other shit. They set about preparations. I found this section of the film felt rushed as if the direction/editing people felt worried that audience attention would wander during the prosaic setup. As it was, mine did anyway. As a side effect of speeding up the preparations the nitty gritty of the intended plan fell by the wayside. As a side effect of this, when the shit hit the fan I had barely a clue as to what the fuck was going on. When that happens it’s completely impossible to care about any of the characters either. When this happened, the film basically became the kind of visual noise where my eyes glazed over and my brain ossified. In all truth, I think most of the population of the western world rarely leave this state because it is actually rather pleasant. I’m a bit of a bastard though, I don’t like it when a film goes from being quite intelligent to being like “Iron Man”.

I can’t highly recommend “Widows” but it wasn’t that bad a film to sit through.

© Alex Rieneck, 2018