Miss Sloane

Jessica Chastain gives a powerful career-best performance in the title role of the excellent "Miss Sloane," which is unquestionably the most compelling political thriller of the year and which will certainly captivate audiences everywhere, particularly ones that include feminists. The film may finally give Miss Chastain the Best Actress Oscar that she has been nominated for twice in the past.

When we first meet Elizabeth Sloane, who is a highly successful fearless strategist in one of Washington's blue chip lobbying companies, she is in the midst of leading her team through some chicanery and very questionably illegal maneuvers in order to help their client kill an Indonesian import-tax bill in Congress, in order to safeguard their lucrative palm oil business. Out of the blue she switches sides, and moves to a small boutique lobbying company to spearhead their campaign to support a new bill for greater gun control.

She has to deal with all the usual cast of morally bankrupt DC players bankrolled by the wealthy gun-lobby, who end up hiring Sloane's old employers. They make the fight even more personal and want to seek some revenge of her personally, as they are still raging with anger about what they consider was her betrayal in walking out on them. In a plot that has an unceasing number of convoluted twists and turns (let alone a shocking ending that has caused controversy amongst many critics), the movie is nothing short of stunning, and it never ever lets up its intense pace for an entire 132 minutes.

Chastain's iron-willed Sloane makes an excellent female protagonist who will succeed (or fail?) because she can outmaneuver the men who dominate the political arena. None of them are on the fence about her: Some will happily work under her as part of a team, others will bitterly resent her success because she is female, whilst the rest of them, recognizing her ruthlessness, are totally cowed and afraid.

As with any heroine, her success has to come at a heavy personal price, and this friendless workaholic has to depend on prescribed uppers to keep her alert, as she has chronic insomnia. She eats in the same cheap Chinese restaurant every single night, as she considers food purely as a basic necessity. She has a similar view on sex, too, and hires male escorts so she can get exactly what she wants without emotional involvement.

This intriguing movie, directed by John Madden from a script by first time screenwriter Jonathan Perera, keeps us guessing to the very end, and is definitely one that is best viewed with scant knowledge of the plot itself. There is an excellent supporting cast that includes Sam Waterson as Sam Dupont, her old boss; Mark Strong as Rodolfo Schmidt, her new boss; John Lithgow as Senator Sterling; and Michael Stuhlbarg as Pat Conners, one her resentful ex-colleagues.

This movie is about women, though, and the only other notable performance is by Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Esme Manucharian, one of Sloane's assistants who ends up being used as a pawn in the fight against the gun lobby.

The time for this movie's release is interesting, in light of the recent backlash over the power of Washington insiders. This will certainly fuel the indignation of those on the political extremes. However, equally important is the message that this movie contains about how powerful women are treated in the political arena. If nothing, it else should be just cause for more movies like this -- and a spur for women to be granted even more prominence in real life.