Martin McDonagh’s latest film focuses on two CIA operatives stationed in Santiago who head to Easter Island on vacation, a trip that reveals a darker purpose.

After delivering storytelling masterclasses like The Banshees of Inisherin and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, McDonagh returns with another contender for his finest work. It’s one of the funniest, most emotionally contemplative, and historically resonant films in years, finding profound meaning in the kind of wicked absurdity that only McDonagh could conjure.

John Malkovich is extraordinary as a veteran agent consumed by cynicism and disillusioned with the crumbling world around him. In lesser hands, he could’ve been little more than a rabid dog biting back at the world. Instead, Malkovich finds a remarkable stillness beneath the rage, moments of clarity that reveal profound dimensions to his character. Sam Rockwell delivers one of his finest performances, bringing an irresistible warmth and humanity to the film. Their magnetic chemistry is elevated by McDonagh’s hilarious dialogue, which finds unexpected moral and historical weight beneath even its most outrageous exchanges.

Steve Buscemi is also at his most brilliant, while Parker Posey steals each of the few scenes she inhabits. Beyond its emotional heft and wicked humor, the film confronts the seemingly endless cycles of political tyranny, suggesting that humanity remains disturbingly incapable of learning from its own history. It makes for the superior pick to see in theaters, whatever your cinematic preference is: fun, thoughtful, charming, or devastating.