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Married to the mob

Set in New York's outer boroughs in 1981 — a year of record crime rates in the city — J.C. Chandor's absorbing drama "A Most Violent Year" (R, Lionsgate) is about honor, ambition, loyalty and ethical calculations, all set against the improbably action-packed backdrop of the home heating oil industry. Even when the drivers for an oil company owner (Oscar Isaac) are brutally hijacked while making their daily runs, he refuses to allow them to arm themselves. But when things get ugly, his wife, Anna (Jessica Chastain), asks if he wants her to call in reinforcements from her mobbed-up family in Brooklyn. Contains obscenity and violence.

Washington Post