Ever since her days on “Parks & Recreation,” Aubrey Plaza has excelled at playing characters who can cut you to ribbons with a withering glance or a deadpan observation—and yet they seem to have just enough vulnerability, a kind of reluctant humanity, that makes them more complex and empathetic than our initial impressions. Plaza is a unique screen presence who adds an electric spark to every project.
In John Patton Ford’s edgy and intense working-class neo-noir thriller “Emily the Criminal,” Plaza does some of the most impressive and richly layered work in her career as a Jersey-born California transplant who made some bad decisions when she was in college and finds herself still trying to climb out of a hole a decade later. It is one of the best performances of the year in one of the best movies of the year.
