Directed by: Ben Affleck
Starring: Ben Affleck, Rebecca Hall, Jeremy Renner, Jon Hamm, Blake Lively
Rating: R

Ben Affleck (left) and Jeremy Renner star in The Town. (Courtesy photo)

It became abundantly clear to me while I was seeing The Town that I was the only person from Massachusetts in the audience. While the movie is plenty good enough if you're from outside Red Sox Nation, it's especially satisfying to understand the references to the Sox and "dirty water." But once you leave the world of sports, this movie doesn't exactly flatter the world of Greater Boston.

In Ben Affleck's second directorial work, he stars as Doug MacRay, a thief trying to turn his life around despite living in the crime-ridden hell that is Charlestown, Massachusetts. His girlfriend, Claire (Rebecca Hall), is the bank manager he and his crew abducted during a recent bank robbery. His best friend, Jem (Jeremy Renner), is a quick-tempered townie-for-life. Jem's sister Krista (Blake Lively), who was once Doug's girlfriend, currently subsists on hard drugs while trying to care for her child (who might be Doug's, we don't know). Meanwhile, FBI agent Adam Frawley (Jon Hamm) is viciously intent on catching MacRay and his gang of robbers. Doug wants to leave and make a new life with Claire, but he has to confess the role he played in her abduction and confront the Charlestown crime elite that have become the closest thing he has to a family. Add to that the local "once a townie, always a townie" attitude and you've got yourself a pretty hefty drama. Add a climactic heist at Fenway Park and you've got yourself a movie that sends shivers down any Bostonian's spine.

Affleck (Good Will Hunting) is quickly learning how to manage behind the camera, both in directing and writing. And while The Town's screenplay has its share of clichés, it's well balanced between action and dialogue and, for the most part, sounds natural. (What impresses me most is that, unlike many crime movies or Martin Scorsese films, the f-word isn't thrown around haphazardly. If characters say it, they mean it, but it's not half of their collective vocabulary.) Thanks to some clean editing and solid camerawork, the production paces well. It never drags, but it also never feels like a shoot-'em-up thriller. It's a nice balance, right in the middle.

The movie's two top-billed actors are Affleck and Jon Hamm (TV's Mad Men). They give solid performances, although Affleck might have bitten off more than he could chew by taking the most complicated role in the movie by far, and Hamm doesn't have enough time on screen to develop Frawley into something more than the standard angry-cop-who's-one-step-behind-the-hero character. I'd say it's the supporting actors, namely Rebecca Hall (Vicky Cristina Barcelona) and Jeremy Renner (The Hurt Locker), that give this movie its oomph. Hall's performance as the oblivious girlfriend has the right amount of honesty and humor to make us laugh at the irony of dating the man who abducted her; when she finds out about his second life, though, we feel genuine fear for her and disgust for MacRay. Renner, in the meantime, gives an exciting performance, pumping the energy of his scenes up from Affleck's subdued melancholy. And Blake Lively (The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants) is satisfying as the trashy Krista, despite overdoing the drugged-up persona a little.

The movie works on just about every level. I wouldn't say it's perfect, but it's still one of the best movies of the year because everything—the acting, the writing, the direction, the sound, the lighting, and more—is of high quality. It's smarter than your average heist flick, but more fun than your average searing human drama. There's a message behind the thick Bostonian accents and the sports jackets Affleck wears throughout the film, a lesson about a man attempting to get out of a world that has him firmly within its grasp. While it may be possible to escape, there are some massive bridges that have to be burned—maybe even bigger than the Zakim Bridge.

Danny Eisenberg is a 2010 graduate of the Bromfield School, where he was a member of the Drama Society and the Academic Bowl Team. He is a student at the University of Pennsylvania.