Author's judgement: 
It is rare to find cinematographic products that deserve above-average attention. Usually we don't use many adjectives, but this time writing that it's an excellent is completely justified. This is the case with this week's proposal: Widows, signed as director and screenplay by Steve Mc Queen (nothing to do with the homonymous actor) already known for his previous success of 12 slave years. It's a genre action thriller of excellent workmanship where all the elements are combined almost perfectly. First of all action: it starts immediately with breathtaking sequences on the scene of a robbery gone bad. The perpetrators of the heist (among these the main one is as excellent as usual Liam Neson) do not come out well and leave their respective wives in complicated conditions. Then it becomes a thriller because every part of the story leaves you surprised and amazed in an uninterrupted succession of tension and action where almost nothing is revealed for what it appears and the twist is always behind the next sequence.
The story (taken from an American television series of the 80s) tells precisely the story of four widows who find themselves entangled in their respective husbands' criminal legacy and, in particular, in the need to return the loot from the robbery to a criminal gang that claims ownership. A story of political corruption is intertwined (just to stay on topical issues), of a local electoral campaign where the candidates, for complementary aspects, represent the dark face of embezzlement, greed, and pure evil. Among the four women (the boss of the situation is a beautiful and capable Viola Davis, twice nominated for an Oscar) a new gang is set up with the aim of carrying out a robbery conceived and designed in detail by one of the authors of the first robbery. The shot is big and aims straight at an important target.
The development of the plot and the plot of the story is too amazing to tell you even one more word. But we can say that all the script holds up perfectly the narrative timing without a moment's pause. In some moments the story slows down and then a right interlude intervenes on the figures of the characters which enriches the whole dynamic. The actors, all or rather all, fully correspond to the characters (a myth of cinema named Robert Duval deserves a mention). In fact, women are the absolute protagonists able to push males of all kinds to the margins of the story, who never succeed even when they want to appear positive.
The director's factory stamp deserves a particular note: use of very close close-ups, very close-up images and almost obsessive attention to detail, together with very interesting long shots. If one really wanted to look for something that doesn't add up, it is a certain reference to something already seen: see Reservoir Dogs by Quentin Tarantino, or many other films of the "big robbery ended more or less well" genre. It is a trend that seems to yield a lot, for decades now: see also the great success of The paper house, produced and streamed by Netflix. This feeling does not detract from this film: it is a classic of the genre that no Italian producer or screenwriter would be able to make, unfortunately!
Not to mention the actors: after seeing Widows try to do an exercise of replacing the various protagonists with Italian actors: with all due respect, esteem and sympathy, it would be hard to find acceptable solutions. Everyone has to do their job: our national cinema has other tasks, we have another culture behind us, another history, which in any case puts us in the foreground. Instead, cinema made in the USA has the task of telling and remembering, even in a modern version, their border past where having a gun and shooting is part of daily life. Fortunately, that's not the case with us.
