Meticulously observed and supremely well acted, Kent Jones’s moving character portrait offers Mary Kay Place a chance to shine in the titular role as a 70ish widow in rural Massachusetts trying to deal with a steadily increasing slate of problems, chief among them her son’s ongoing battle with drug addiction. As she runs from neighbor to neighbor, delivering casseroles and offering counsel, Diane comes across as unselfish and personable, but her ever-present look of worry for the future of her son (Jake Lacy) also suggests there is more here than we initially suspect. Slowly but steadily, Jones and Place reveal Diane’s past; the result is a masterpiece of understatement where seemingly idle table talk masks a profound current of thought and feeling running just beneath the surface. A deeply rooted sense of place — the wintry setting becomes a character in itself — adds an additional layer to one of the finest American films of the year.

Director Kent Jones