Dir: Ben Affleck, 2010
Gripping, gritty and really well-done.
Doug MacRay (Ben Affleck) is the brains behind a band of bank and armored truck robbers. When one of their jobs gets hairy, they take assistant bank manager Claire Keesey (Rebecca Hall) as a hostage. After they let her go, Doug tries to do damage control by finding out what Claire saw/heard, but he ends up falling for her instead. Doug wants out of the crime life, Charlestown and everything he's ever known and Claire's the perfect impetus. Meanwhile, ruthless FBI guy Adam Frawley (Jon Hamm) is closing in on the Townies and local thugs are pressuring Doug to stay shady.
The Town is intense, excellently paced and with great breaks of humor between the heart-in-throat moments and shootouts. The two-plus hours are packed with suspense, warmth, and great lines. It's smart. Sometimes sexy. Full of solid acting from everyone involved, especially Jeremy Renner, who plays Doug's hard ex-con best friend Jim. Hamm and Hall don't disappoint and Affleck delivers both behind and in front of the camera.
It's a great movie to see if you want internal conflicts. Doug and his friends are criminals. And not like the caper-perps of the Ocean's flicks, either. They are bad bad men; they kill people without remorse. This isn't sugar-coated or romanticized. On the other hand, Agent Frawley is a nasty sonuvabitch who doesn't care who he has to hurt or manipulate to reach his endgame. And then — because you're multi-armed like a Hindu god — there's also the fact that Affleck is so affable, the motherless, washed-up Doug so relatable, that you at least want a happy ending for him. Oh, and who wants to root against love? As the movie unfolds, you also see that Jim, despite being fairly despicable, is far more honorable than anyone on the other side of the law.
Maybe this is premature, but Affleck might be to Boston's underbelly what Kevin Smith was to Central Jersey slackerdom.
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