#I AM GANGSTER. MOVIE#

For all its admirable qualities, вЂњIвЂ™m Your WomanвЂќ suffers from the same molasses-drip pacing that plagued Hart and HorowitzвЂ™s oddball 2018 sci-fi saga вЂњFast Color.вЂќ ItвЂ™s a delicate dance, keeping the audience in the dark.

If only the filmвЂ™s execution were half as exciting as its ideas. Director Hart - who wrote the screenplay and produced the picture with her husband Jordan Horowitz - has said she got the idea for вЂњIвЂ™m Your WomanвЂќ after wondering what happened to Robert MitchumвЂ™s wife at the end of вЂњ The Friends of Eddie Coyle.вЂќ ItвЂ™s really a brilliant concept for a film, forcing viewers to ask ourselves all sorts of important and uncomfortable questions about who we gravitate to at the center of our stories and why.

#I AM GANGSTER. MOVIE#

The gangsterвЂ™s girlfriend and the loyal Black sidekick are typically the two most disposable figures in pulp fiction, yet in this movie theyвЂ™re our protagonists. ThereвЂ™s a massive mob war raging in the city that would be the main focus of just about any other movie, but вЂњIвЂ™m Your WomanвЂќ stays out in the sticks with the characters so often ignored in these stories. They hit the road and try to lay low for a while, but unfortunately, this is a time and place where a Black man traveling with a white woman attracts the wrong kind of attention. Luckily, heвЂ™s good with babies, because Jean sure isnвЂ™t. SheвЂ™s assigned a bodyguard, an old acquaintance named Cal (ArinzГ© Kene) who owes Eddie a favor. Maybe they think she knows more than she does, or maybe they think they can use her and the baby to get to Eddie. HeвЂ™s done something really bad this time - though weвЂ™re not told exactly what - and EddieвЂ™s panicked partners pound on the door in the middle of the night, rushing Jean and her baby to a motel with a big bag of cash. Bill Heck and Rachel Brosnahan in 'I'm Your Woman.' (Courtesy Wilson Webb/Amazon Studios)

An early scene explaining their relationship inverts the famous final shot of вЂњThe Godfather,вЂќ so that when Eddie closes the door to do business with his buddies, we and the camera stay in the kitchen with Jean. Jean doesnвЂ™t ask many questions about what her husband does for a living, not even when he brings home a newborn baby and announces that itвЂ™s вЂњtheirsвЂќ now. MaiselвЂќ) as Jean, the pouty, none-too-bright wife of Bill HeckвЂ™s movie-star handsome gangster, Eddie. The movie stars Rachel Brosnahan (of AmazonвЂ™s вЂњThe Marvelous Mrs. ItвЂ™s a 1970s crime picture told from the POV of the gun moll, a character continually cast to the side and kept in the dark. вЂњ IвЂ™m Your Woman,вЂќ a thoughtful, if not entirely successful, new thriller from director Julia Hart, flips this formula in a provocative way. TheyвЂ™ve served their story purpose and must be dismissed so that the action can begin in earnest. We almost never hear another word about these women. A lot of times theyвЂ™re stashed in a safe house run by some friendly cronies weвЂ™ve met earlier in the film, or the hero will tell his girlfriend to go stay at her sisterвЂ™s, typically giving a big speech about how he canвЂ™t let her be a part of whatвЂ™s about to happen next. If you watch enough crime pictures youвЂ™re familiar with the obligatory scene roughly three-quarters into the movie when the women are sent away.

I am gangster.