Texas Killing Fields

Year: 2011
Director:  Ami Canaan Mann
Starring: Sam Worthington, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Jessica Chastain, Chloe Grace Moretz

Texas Killing Fields is my unofficial "part two" of a Worthington and Chastain film. I came upon this and THE DEBT around the same time and so I decided to review them back to back.

This movie is hard to describe in terms of genre because the genre that it would traditionally be described as would take away from the movie's effectiveness. I suppose I would categorize it as a cop drama, but with way more plot depth than a typical cop drama would be. Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Sam Worthington play partners who are trying to solve a murder in their city, Texas City. They are also put into a obligated situation to help out Jessica Chastain (who works for another police department) with her missing persons - turned - homicide case. While the officers try to solve these crimes they are also going through things in their lives separately that dictates their actions and pushes them to certain breaking points.

For the second time in a row, I found myself actually enjoying another Sam Worthington acting job. I'm surprised. In both THE DEBT and this film, he seems to have found what he is good at in acting. He plays a blatant jerk who using violence and aggression to be a great cop. Along with his surprising performance was a solid "good cop" acting job by Jeffrey Dean Morgan who plays mature very well and Jessica Chastain who once again acts her heart out even though her character was not a focal point.



I liked this movie. I liked the pace of the movie and how the slowness of a Texan, Southern city reflected the tone of the movie. The writing was decent, but the plot and the story were powerful and at times disturbing.

Go see this film.

Score: B

The Debt

Year: 2010
Director: John Madden
Starring: Helen Mirren, Jessica Chastain, Sam Worthington, Tom Wilkinson

The Debt was a product of one of my new favorite actresses, Jessica Chastain. I loved her in it, but I also really enjoyed the movie. The Debt is a espionage suspense thriller about three Jewish spies who attempt to kidnap a notorious Nazis surgeon and bring him back to Israel to stand trial for his crimes. The writing was pretty good as well as the directing, but what made the film for me was the acting. Obviously, Helen Mirren and Tom Wilkinson are great actors but I was most impressed with the aforementioned Jessica Chastain. She was pretty amazing in this film. She beautifully portrayed a young woman faced with capturing a man, alive, who was responsible for the death of so many of her people including her mother. Also I found myself actually liking the performance by Sam Worthington. I'm not a huge fan of his. Even though his movies are good, his acting has never impressed me. In The Debt I was surprised by his performance. I feel he is better suited for a secondary character role where he doesn't have to carry a movie.

The Debt was a pretty good movie. I was entertained throughout and was just in awe of Jessica Chastain. This movie acted it's way to a good review.

Score: B+