Bank Job a Criminally Good Thriller
Terry (Jason Statham) has held the short straw for most of his life. His posh used car shop isn’t exactly doing well, the fact the local loan shark keeps sending thugs to damage his merchandise because of unpaid bills certainly not helping matters.
Daniel Mays, Saffron Burrows, Stephen Campbell Moore and Jason Statham in Lionsgate Films' The Bank Job
Things might be looking up, however, old flame and former model Martine (Saffron Burrows) stopping by for an unexpected visit brandishing a once in a lifetime offer maybe to irresistible to refuse. You see, she’s got the inside scoop on a foolproof heist involving one of the ultra-rich on London’s Baker Street, and Terry and his cadre of minor league reprobate best friends are the perfect ones to help her pull off the job.
But what nobody realizes is that the targets vault filled with super-secret safety deposit boxes contains photographs, ledgers and documentations stretching into the upper echelons of the British government. Even the Royal Family is involved, and everyone from the crème de la crème of the underworld to the dirtiest members of Scotland Yard are willing to do whatever it takes get all this seedy information back under their control.
Inspired by Britain’s most notorious heist, dubbed “The Walkie-Talkie Robbery” by London newspapers in 1971 due to the fact the group’s radio communications were inadvertently recorded by local ham radio operators, director Roger Donaldson’s The Bank Job is easily the best film the wildly uneven filmmaker has made since 1987’s No Way Out. Equal parts thrilling and inventive, this briskly entertaining crime caper is an unqualified keeper, and for fans of the genre who have thrilled over the decades to works as varied as Rififi, The Asphalt Jungle, The Great Train Robbery, The Italian Job, Heat and Ocean’s 11 this is the film all of them have been waiting for.
Working from an economically constructed screenplay by scribes Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais (Across the Universe, Flushed Away), the filmmakers have manufactured a crackerjack film that kept me enthralled and eager to see what was going to happen next first frame to last. The first half is particularly strong, and while none of the pre-heist team building or preparations are anything we haven’t seen many times before these scenes are handled with such dynamic virtuosity they almost feel original and new.
They’re not, of course, and in all fairness it isn’t like The Bank Job does a single thing none of the other great thrillers about thieves have done numerous times before. More, when all is said and done there isn’t very many places for all this to go, the final few moments not so much telegraphed as they are expected diluting to some extent the chances of the picture attaining anything close to maximum impact.
So what. Donaldson hasn’t shown this much confidence behind the camera in ages, the director confidently moving things from here to there with energy and vitality to spare. From Michael Coulter’s (Notting Hill) crackling stripped-down cinematography to John Gilbert’s (The Lord of the Ring: The Fellowship of the Ring) expertly controlled editing, this is the kind of old-school thrill ride masters of the genre like John Frankenheimer or Jules Dassin would probably rise from their graves and applaud; it’s that good.
For Statham, this film offers some sort of long justified confirmation of his status as both a true leading man and as a two-fisted tough guy actor cut from the Bruce Willis/Clint Eastwood cloth. The problem for him is that, after two strong starts working for Guy Ritchie (most notably in Snatch), the rest of his filmography doesn’t exactly inspire standing ovations.
But like Willis rising to the occasion for John McTiernan in Die Hard or Eastwood making a look-at-me statement with Sergio Leone in A Fistful of Dollars, the actor grabs the roll of Terry by the horns and makes something instantly classic out of him. This is the antihero he was born to play, and if Statham doesn’t make more of his career after this he’s really only going to have himself to blame.
All of which is my way of saying The Bank Job is a great time at the movies. It stole my heart and robbed me of all my apprehensions, skillfully picking my pocket of everything negative and leaving only happy thoughts in their stead. While it is usually true crime doesn’t pay, in the case of this film the only thing criminal would be to miss seeing it in the theater.
Film Rating: êêê (out of 4)
Additional Links:
- The Bank Job Theatrical Trailer
