A review of the new female heist movie “Widows”
It is so good to see more leading roles for women in mainstream films, even in a genre like the heist movie where men have traditionally dominated.
It is only a few months ago that we had “Ocean’s Eight” where all the gang members were female and now with “Widows” again we have an all-female team, but this time the characters – as well as being fewer – are deeper (and mostly of colour) and the action is grittier. In fact, this is a remake of a British work – the television drama by Lynda La Plante – and the director and co-writer is the British Steve McQueen, but the action is relocated from London in 2002 to Chicago in 2008.
It is an impressive cast with African-American Viola Davis (a really strong performance), Latin American Michelle Rodriguez, black British Cynthia Erivo and Polish/Australian Elizabeth Debicki playing the gang members and some well-known actors – Liam Neeson, Colin Farrell and Robert Duvall – taking smaller male roles.
Following an exciting opening sequence in which an all-male gang is explosively wiped out, there are some tough action scenes, some clever twists and plenty of social observations which altogether make this a most satisfying work.