A Most Violent Year stars Oscar Isaac as Abel Morales; an able, moral capitalist, in a corrupt 1981 New York. The film centres around Morales trying to acquire a oil storage facility that will allow him to expand exponentially, but will put him heavily in debt if it falls through. However, everything out of Morales control interferes with this acquisition.

Being familiar with all the literary influences for this film made it boring: Oscar Isaac staring across the bay; The Great Gatsby, "The noble capitalist"; Ayn Rand, are the two that jumped out at me. Consequently, the film feels derivative; even the plots progression follows themes that have been exhausted. About 10 minutes into the film I knew how it was going to end, and even how every scene was going to end. Just to point it out; "Able Morals" here is going to finish everything as ably and morally as possible.

The historical context also film drains the film of tension; Reganominics was on the horizon, the cleanup of New York, the breaking up of the unions etc. You almost know who is going to be a thorn in Morales side next. You may pick on me for being pedantic, but this film takes itself very seriously, and everything in the film is deliberate, and when you know what they are going for the film loses so much of its veneer.

This is also the first film I have seen directed by J. C. Chandor and he did a great job establishing tone. Chandor always places Morales in powerful positions on the screen, he also uses gold tints to give a sense of decay and tackiness. He, however, repeats scenes and this added to my boredom; I think there are 4 running scenes, 6 power exchanges, and many, many negotiation scenes.

Acting in the movie was suffocated by everything else. Oscar Isaac has only one motivation in the film; be as stoic as possible. Sometimes he cracks and the emotions are lost in how little impact the rest of the film has. Jessica Chastain character might as well been called Lady MacBeth, and she does make a commendable attempt at adding depth to the character, but I disdained the cliché. All the other actors are just background noise, and secondary characters felt wooden.

This is an uninteresting movie, that never fully develops, has no satisfying conclusion, and breaks no new ground.