A visual artist whose movies have dealt with starvation, sex addiction, and slavery, Steve McQueen has never been considered a safe commercial bet.
That just makes “Widows,” his bracing, moody heist thriller about women who finish the robbery their husbands started, all the more satisfying: McQueen has made a first-rate genre exercise that doubles as a treatise on race and gender, juggling dramatic payoff with heavier themes.
“Widows” embraces its trashy, melodramatic twists while deepening their potential.
If all escapism looked like this, America would be smart again.With an aesthetic that merges the blithe energy of “Ocean’s Eight” with the griminess of “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo,” McQueen adapts the ‘80s British TV series into a gritty Chicago crime saga, weaving a handful of characters into a web of corruption that threatens them all.
In a dynamic opening sequence, several robbers lead by the fast-talking Harry (Liam Neeson
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