In this scene from J.C. Chandor‘s A Most Violent Year, David Oyelowo alludes to Jessica Chastain‘s mobbed-up dad, who’s in prison the whole time and is never seen but is very much a presence in the film. Mob guys on the inside are always talking to guys on the outside, of course, and if they want someone hurt or fucked with, it tends to happen. Oyelowo is playing it cool and acting like it’s water off a duck’s ass, but he knows this. A Most Violent Year is one of the year’s finest films, no question. Right up there with Birdman, Gone Girl, Boyhood, Whiplash, Nightcrawler, The Drop, Locke, etc. More commanding, better written and more finely-tuned than The Gambler, Selma or American Sniper — easily the biggest push-through of 2014 AFI Fest. Sorry, dawg, but whaddaya want me to do…lie?