Rent Heist on Amazon Video (paid link)
Written by: David Mamet
Directed by: David Mamet
Starring: Gene Hackman, Rebecca Pidgeon, Danny DeVito, Delroy Lindo, Sam Rockwell, Ricky Jay, Patti LuPone
Rated: R
Watch the trailer
Plot
A career jewel thief finds himself at tense odds with his longtime partner, a crime boss who sends his nephew to keep watch.
Verdict
It has it's moments, but ultimately it's frustrating with an underwhelming conclusion. This takes too long to get into the main heist. From that point it's a series of misdirection as we're never quite sure where the goods are or who is pulling a fast one on whom. The movie juggles that for quite a while, but just doesn't land the ending.
Skip it.
Review
Joe (Gene Hackman) is an accomplished and thorough thief. We get to see a highly orchestrated jewelry store heist with a large crew. It's clear this isn't their first time out. The movie sets up a scenario where Joe wants out but has to commit to a new job anyway.
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| Gene Hackman, Delroy Lindo play Joe Moore, Bobby Blane |
This takes a while to get started as nothing goes according to plan. Once it finally starts, it's a great premise full of redirects and fakes. What makes Joe so good is that he can predict how the events of the heist will happen and how people will react. This is one of those it could only happen in a movie plot. There's no way Joe could predict how people will behave and react with the accuracy we see. That makes me wonder how a guy this good never saved up for retirement. Did he dump all his money into building boats? Does crime just not pay in this movie?
I like how this keeps you guessing. You never quite know what is happening with all the twists. The plan is never the plan. This has a lot of neat twists, but the movie lacks the energy of modern movies. This is never as fun as it should be. The gunfights especially feel dated from the sound effects to the effectiveness.
The thing that tanks the ending is changing allegiances. The movie builds no case for it, and I didn't even know one of Joe's team had switched sides. I had to rewind the end to make sure I understood. This focuses so hard on the misdirections that it drops other aspects of the story. Joe's girlfriend falls for Jimmy, but that didn't seem believable. Jimmy's been a scumbag the whole movie. I thought it was more misdirection until the movie ended. At that point I was just confused.
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