Ben Affleck’s directorial debut is a stylish descent into the lower depths of his native Boston, as mapped out by local-boy novelist Dennis Lehane. The director’s brother and star, Casey Affleck, whispery and inward, grips the movie in his fist without breaking a sweat. The picture is violent and sometimes bloody, the way it has to be. Mark Margolis and Trudi Goodman, as a pair of pathetic, middle-aged cokeheads, give the picture a jolt of weirdo energy in one of the year’s creepiest sequences.

And Ed Harris, as a too-long-time detective, gives possibly his most feral performance ever. Special shout-out to Boston rapper Slaine, who plays neighborhood drug kingpin Bubba Rogowski the kind of strapped ass-kicker you’d want on your side should you ever have the misfortune to be in his neighborhood. This was another film with a deflating conclusion (the approximate message is that no good deed goes unpunished).

But as was the case with “No Country for Old Men,” the unresolved story continued to scratch around in your brain after you’d left the theatre.