The Town

Ben Affleck's second attempt in the director's chair, The Town, has proven that he knows how to make a film. He got a lot out of his cast: Rebecca Hall, Jon Hamm, Jeremy Renner, Blake Lively, and even himself.

His film tells the story of a group of bank robbers in Charlestown born and bred into the life of robbery. Their fathers robbed banks before them and we get the sense that the cycle has been going on for quite some time. They are controlled and directed by Fergie, flower shop owner and coke-peddler, who the FBI has known about and tried to take down for years. Ultimately they are unable to provide any proof of his crimes. The movie opens with their first robbery of a small Charlestown bank. With insiders at various companies they are able to track the delivery of money and the type of vault a bank houses. All information is gathered prior to the robbery in order to ensure nothing goes wrong. During this particular robbery Doug (Affleck) and Jim (Renner) collect all the money on hand, however, Jim, a bit of a hot head, bloodies the face of a manager and decides to take the other manager, Claire (Hall) as his hostage. Doug calms her down, assures her she will not be hurt and they drop her off blindfolded at the beach. They have stolen her license though, and later find out that she lives blocks away from their neighborhood. Not wanting to take a chance at running into her on the streets, Jim proposes to the group that he will take care of the problem, but Doug intervenes, understanding that he will be able to assess the situation with greater control than Jim. He ends up stalking Claire and positioning himself at her laundromat to make sure she cannot recognise him. From there the two begin talking and go on to develop a relationship where Doug finds himself falling in love.

Meanwhile, Claire notifies the FBI of her kidnapping and begins working with Agent Frawley (Hamm) to identify a suspect. Unable to provide any defining characteristics, her situation looks rather bleak. Later we learn that she withholds information from the police, confiding in Doug that she saw one of the robber's tattoos of a fighting irishman.

In order for his fragile universe to remain intact, Doug ends up keeping his involvement with Claire from Jim and decides against telling Claire any information about his role in the robbery. Instead, in hopes of creating a better life for himself, he decides to leave his life of theivery behind and Charlestown as well, even asking Claire to come with him. A tangled web of relationships and loyalty seems to get in the way however as he struggles to break free from the control of his employers.

I saw The Town a few days ago and have just begun to write about it. It's because I haven't quite been able to put my finger on the emotions it stirred up in me. The gun fights, battery, and substance abuse are jarring. Affleck does an excellent job with the realism of a life addicted to cocaine, fighting to survive the bleak hand life dealt. The violence Jim inflicts on those who get in his way is second nature to him. He walks away from those situations as though it's just a part of his life, completely prepared to exhibit this force again, no shred of remorse. There are no thoughts of morality in these instances, no wavering between right and wrong. Jim's sister, Krista (Lively), strung out and raising a child, bounces around from man to man. As she comes in contact with Agent Frawley she questions what he's using her for, revealing her feelings about the only role men have ever played in her life. There's a hopelessness about this film. The characters who have never been exposed to any other world never have a thought of doing anything other than what they have always done. Life begins and ends right where it started.

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