This movie I went into almost blind, but I came out of the theater with it probably being my favorite film in the last year. This film is so smart at being able to keep you at the edge of your seat from simple things that they plug into the film. Heartbreaking and tense situations in the first half of the film come back in some shape or form that leave you questioning what is going to happen. There was genuinely no predicting what the characters were going to do and how they would react to certain events. This unpredictability doesn't just apply to situations, but possibly more notable in character arcs. Without giving to much away, there is a character in this film that does everything possible for you to hate them in the first half, and by the end of the film you are rooting for said character. There's times where the characters that you cared for are becoming real and dis-likable in certain scenes, but to the point of more so being genuinely worried about how their choices will affect them.
Every actor in this film did so tremendous as well. I really can't think of an actor or actress that outshines the rest. But if I had to pick favorites, Frances McDormand and Sam Rockwell were just that. But a lot of that just has to go into the writing of the characters themselves. The cinematography in this film allows the actors to take advantage of facial expression. There's a scene relatively early in the film that is mostly sitting and staring but the actors have such convincing movements and gestures, it goes to a point where you don't need dialogue to tell what they are feeling and what they are thinking about.
Really the only issue I have in this film is some scenes felt a little unnecessary. Can't give away too much without spoiling, but in a film where every character goes through in arc, there's one character that is just there to break tension and crack personally unfunny jokes. But this character did not affect my score and they were barely in the film.
I highly recommend checking this out.
