Miss Sloane

Watching this movie can easily make one wonder: with all the paranoia about a terrorist group taking out an American city, if that city were Washington...would we really be losing so much? Perhaps this portrait of official and unofficial amorality in the nation's capital is a little too cynical, and thus should not inspire such a question. What is unquestionable is that here we have yet another film that celebrates excessive cleverness, both its own and that of its characters, including the titular anti-heroine played by Jessica Chastain. She does her usual great job--Chastain is neck-and-neck with Amy Adams in the race for "current best American actress"--in a movie that she owns from start to finish. Whether you will enjoy this work depends mostly upon your tolerance for this sort of paean to cleverness; in this viewer's case, I found its excesses forgivable, given its solid performances, good pacing, and at least somewhat interesting political viewpoint. It gets my vote.