(CNN) -- In a place that does not exist -- a black site -- Maya (Jessica Chastain) watches as her colleague Dan (Jason Clarke) interrogates an Arab prisoner. "If you lie to me, I hurt you," Dan says to the prisoner, who is bound, bruised, and not telling the Americans what they need to know. Soon, the prisoner will be held down on the floor with a cloth over his face and will have water poured into his mouth until he is half-drowned. This is waterboarding, and it leaves the prisoner gasping like a dying fish. But he does not give up his secrets, and will not until later in the game.
@highlight
The film follows how a CIA analyst worked for a decade tracking down Osama bin Laden
@highlight
Director Kathryn Bigelow has been accused of endorsing torture
@highlight
Jessica Chastain delivers one of the must-see performances of the year, our critic says
@placeholder throws us in at the deep end, and rightly so.