A Most Violent Year (2014)
Director: J.C. Chandor Run Time: 124 min. Rating: R Release Year: 2014
Starring: Alessandro Nivola, David Oyelowo, Elyes Gabel, Jessica Chastain, Oscar Isaac
Country: United States, United Arab Emirates
Language: English, Spanish
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About the film:
A thriller set in New York City during the winter of 1981, statistically one of the most violent years in the city’s history, and centered on the lives of an immigrant and his family trying to expand their business and capitalize on opportunities as the rampant violence, decay, and corruption of the day drag them in and threaten to destroy all they have built.
“resonates as the rare film to not simply take its superficial cues from The Godfather, but to truly understand its underlying ideas—and, more impressive still, to re-work them into something thrillingly unique.”
—Nick Schager for The Daily Beast
About the filmmaker:
Writer and director J.C. Chandor exemplifies the ability to tell a broad array of stories with flair, garnering critical acclaim for his breakthrough pictures Margin Call (2011), All Is Lost (2013), and A Most Violent Year (2014). Chandor worked primarily as a commercial director for a decade and a half before writing and directing his first feature film, Margin Call (2011), a timely story about the 2008 financial crisis with a top-tier cast. Upon its premiere at the 27th Annual Sundance Film Festival, the star-studded drama/thriller earned a warm reception from critics, and went on to snag an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay.
Chandor’s next film, the one-man movie All Is Lost (2013), starred Robert Redford as a nameless individual lost at sea, battling the elements and his own fleeting sanity without uttering more than a few words. The next year, Chandor would return to traditional narrative with A Most Violent Year (2014), a slow-burning thriller starring Oscar Isaac and Jessica Chastain as a married couple reluctantly anchored to the world of New York crime. In 2019, Chandor directed the action thriller Triple Frontier for Netflix, and is currently at work on the comic book adaptation Kraven the Hunter.