Vera Farmiga has a hilarious bit as a huffy Balkan streetwalker wearing very little under her overcoat.

NEWYORKER: Breaking and Entering

With Martin Sheen, Mark Wahlberg, and Alec Baldwin as cops, and Vera Farmiga as a police psychiatrist who is attracted to both young men.

NEWYORKER: The Departed

One way points to despair, the other to bliss, and Farmiga, as actress and director, is equipped to travel in both directions: down to the pit, or, once more, up in the air.

NEWYORKER: Devotions

You could argue that the film is too wrenching a departure for an actress as earthy as Farmiga, but that, I suspect, is why she took the risk daring herself, in the person of Corinne, to slip the surly bonds of beauty and desire.

NEWYORKER: Devotions