Review: Inside Man
People love a good heist movie. Who wouldn't love to be part of a brilliantly planned out robbery that goes off without a hitch? Who wouldn't love to have been standing there, with Ocean's Eleven or The Italian Job, knowing that you just got away with 20 million dollars? A good heist movie makes regular folks like me 'n' you want to be the getaway driver, the computer hacker or the munitions expert. But what if none of those positions were necessary to pull off a job? What if all you needed was the perfect plan? Spike Lee attempts to answer that in Inside Man, starring Denzel Washington as Det. Frazier and Clive Owen as bank-robber elite Dalton Russell.
Of course it makes it a lot easier to escape when you're not trying to get away with duffel bags full of cash, but instead, something with even greater value: Assurance. I'm not going to detail it, since then what would be the point of seeing it. Det. Frazier is called to deal with a hostage situation at a Manhattan bank. He's not the first choice, but the primary negotiator is on vacation, so he's the man. Meanwhile, the perps are inside, prepping the hostages for the long haul. They each have tricks up their sleeves, and believe themselves to be outwitting the other. Throwing a wrench in the works is Madeleine White (Jodie Foster, criminally underused here), who insinuates herself into the situation on behalf of a third party, Arthur Case (Christopher Plummer) who owns the bank and would like to make sure the secrets held by the bank will stay that way. She has her own way of dealing with problems such as these and tries to make promises to both Russell and Frazier.
It soon becomes apparent to Frazier that "this ain't no bank robbery" and starts to piece together what could really be going on. He and Russell have an easy rapport, but Russell isn't giving out anything that could bring him down. The robbery ends suddenly, leaving Frazier unprepared, and the rest of the film floats along slowly, as he tries to figure out the puzzling details. It's a fine heist movie, to be sure, but it's not a great one, like Reservoir Dogs or Heat or even Snatch, but it gives us everything on the heist movie checklist: Charismatic criminal mastermind, high-stakes game of cat-and-mouse, unhinged authority figures, it's all there. With a little push and maybe some tweaking, this could have been a great one.
∆∆∆1/2 of 5
Of course it makes it a lot easier to escape when you're not trying to get away with duffel bags full of cash, but instead, something with even greater value: Assurance. I'm not going to detail it, since then what would be the point of seeing it. Det. Frazier is called to deal with a hostage situation at a Manhattan bank. He's not the first choice, but the primary negotiator is on vacation, so he's the man. Meanwhile, the perps are inside, prepping the hostages for the long haul. They each have tricks up their sleeves, and believe themselves to be outwitting the other. Throwing a wrench in the works is Madeleine White (Jodie Foster, criminally underused here), who insinuates herself into the situation on behalf of a third party, Arthur Case (Christopher Plummer) who owns the bank and would like to make sure the secrets held by the bank will stay that way. She has her own way of dealing with problems such as these and tries to make promises to both Russell and Frazier.
It soon becomes apparent to Frazier that "this ain't no bank robbery" and starts to piece together what could really be going on. He and Russell have an easy rapport, but Russell isn't giving out anything that could bring him down. The robbery ends suddenly, leaving Frazier unprepared, and the rest of the film floats along slowly, as he tries to figure out the puzzling details. It's a fine heist movie, to be sure, but it's not a great one, like Reservoir Dogs or Heat or even Snatch, but it gives us everything on the heist movie checklist: Charismatic criminal mastermind, high-stakes game of cat-and-mouse, unhinged authority figures, it's all there. With a little push and maybe some tweaking, this could have been a great one.
∆∆∆1/2 of 5
posted by The Man in Charge at
6:10 PM
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