Animal Kingdom

When his mother dies of an overdose, seventeen-year-old Joshua goes to the grandmother he has been kept away from for years. The house is a crime family: four uncles in armed robbery and drugs, with the police closing in. Janine is what holds them together, speaking in the language of love and prepared to give up her own grandson if it comes to it. Joshua has to pick a side. David Michôd wrote and directed. Ben Mendelsohn, Joel Edgerton, Guy Pearce, Luke Ford, Sullivan Stapleton, Jacki Weaver and James Frecheville are in the cast. The screenplay came out of the real Pettingill family of Melbourne, and particularly the Walsh Street case that ended in 1988, when Trevor Pettingill, Victor Peirce and two other men were acquitted of murdering two Victoria police officers. It screened in the World Cinema Dramatic competition at the Sundance Film Festival on 22 January 2010 and won the Grand Jury Prize. Jacki Weaver was nominated for Best Supporting Actress at the 2011 Academy Awards. Who it is for: viewers who like cold crime films that do not rely on pace. Who it is not for: anyone expecting action. The violence is sudden and brief and the rest is built on waiting and threat.