★★★½
“Widows piqued.”
This is based on a TV series from Britain, which ran for two seasons in the eighties – I’ve seen it, but for some reason never got round to writing about it. The show would have been right in our wheelhouse, being written by Lynda LaPlante, who also created Prime Suspect. This version transplants the action from London to Chicago, and retains the basis story at its core. When their husbands die in connection with an attempted armed robbery, the wives of the late participants decide to take up the mantle of criminal enterprise, using a dossier of plans left behind. However, the motive is different here. The money stolen, and subsequently destroyed, belonged to crime boss Jamal Manning, who demands Veronica Rawlings (Davis), wife of the robbers’ leader, repay it back. All two million dollars of it.
It ups the ante compared to the British version: there, it was largely a desire by Mrs. Rawlins, simply to follow in her husband’s footsteps. It probably makes Veronica more sympathetic, though she’s not quite as hard-ass as Dolly was, across the pond. Less effective is the desire to add various political and social subtexts to things. For Manning is standing for office in a local election, seeking to disrupt things by going up against Jack Mulligan (Farrell), the scion of a long-standing dynasty. While it turns out both the original robbery and Veronica’s planned crime play into this power struggle, it does divert from the main story. And don’t even get me started on the Rawlings’ son having been killed by the police, an entirely pointless thread. [Except when shooting people, the cops here are notable by their absence] With considerably less time available than in the original, which ran for six, hour-long episodes, this is problematic.
It’s especially so when it comes to depicting the rest of the widows beyond Veronica, who are given scant attention in term of their characters. This is a shame, especially in the case of Alice Gunner (Debicki). The actress cuts a striking figure, not least because she’s 6’2″ – or one inch shorter than Brienne of Tarth. :) Rodriguez is similarly wasted, in a role that doesn’t make much use of her presence. Fortunately, Davis is up to the task, and is just as impressive as she was in Lila & Eve. [Though despite some efforts, Chris still hasn’t got me to watch Davis in How to Get Away With Murder!]
Falling therefore into the category of good, rather than great, it would perhaps have been better to copy the British structure and make this a mini-series – though does anyone still make those any more? Shonda Rimes is, perhaps, the contemporary American version of LaPlante, and the creator of HtGAWM would have seemed an ideal person to do such an adaptation justice. Water under the bridge, however, and if you can overlook the occasionally over-earnest wokeness on display, this is still solid enough, anchored perfectly well by Davis’s fibe performance.
Dir: Steve McQueen
Star: Viola Davis, Michelle Rodriguez, Elizabeth Debicki, Colin Farrell