Yesterday my sweetie-wife and I had a lunch and then caught an early afternoon showing of Widows.

The story of four women, suddenly indebted to the mob after their criminal husbands are killed in a botched job, the film is more personal and darker than what many expected. Though not expressly marketed as a ‘heist’ movie in the vein of Ocean’s Elevenor Logan LuckyI have heard from many sources that people are expecting the sort of light entertainment that genre is known for. (As we walked out of the theater I heard one person behind me comment ‘I thought it was supposed to be a comedy.’) Widows, inspired by an ITV television series, is a crime more and while it is not a noiror even a neo-noirit is a film about flawed people and violent lives where trust is an impossible commodity.

Viola Davis leads the cast as Veronica the leader and driving force of the assemblage and while the other actors. Michelle Rodriguez, and Cynthia Erivo, gave fine performances it is Elizabeth Debicki, whom genre fans would recognize if she were painted gold as she was in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, which supplies the film standout portrayal as Alice the beautiful woman who goes from someone manipulated and pushed around by everyone to confident and capable individual. Beyond our protagonist team the film is rounded out by Collin Farrell as an rising and but flawed Chicago politician, Robert Duvall as his overbearing father, and Daniel Kaluuya inhabiting a villain commands the screens with cool, cruel, indifference.

I enjoyed the movie and anytime it focused on the four women and the struggles is worked quite well but when the plot strayed in to side quests dealing with the internal issues of either the mob or the politicians I found the results generated questions that undermined my suspension of disbelief. I suspect director Steve McQueen’s original cut may have been sustainably longer and answered these issues but I can only judge what was screened. If you go be aware while not visually graphic the film is violence and depicts that with a cold eye that avoids glamorization.

Overall the film was enjoyable but nothing I will add to my home media collection.