I really am a bit lost for words to describe how magnificent this movie is, because IMAGES are what makes this classic burn through my heart. Words are failing when images are so powerful as in "A Most Violent Year"... Seen it 5 times already since it's release and it is here to stay. Gets better with every viewing...

It is not a big drama or thriller, it is the story of the struggle to build up an business empire, depicting the thin line between achieving succes and becoming complicit in violence. Oscar Isaac plays an upcoming oil distributor in New York back in the eighties, at a time when crime was running wild in the big apple. Married to a mob's daugther he still wants to walk the righteous path without using his wife's mob connections to make a succes of his oilbusiness. Will he succeed in being a honest businessman or will he cave in under pressure and use the mob to build up his new oil company?

This movie became a classic at the very moment it was released. You just gotta see it to believe it. It is not the story that is monumental, the acting is though. The very best of Oscar Isaac, Jessica Chastain and Albert Brooks.

The way this tale of succes and deceit is photographed and scored deserves nothing but praise. Eye and ear candy! The direction by J.C. Chandor builds up a tension that absorbs every second of film. Few directors are capable of creating such delicate, intense, contineous suspense. J.C Chandor's masterpiece.