The Bank Job MARCH 20 2008 (wgvu) - Roger Donaldson is one of those directors that has fallen through the cracks of my memory. He's best know in America for the Hollywood blockbusters he directed in the 1980s, No Way Out, the film that made Kevin Costner a movie star, and Cocktail, the one where Tom Cruise played a juggling bartender. But he made a huge impression on my movie going sensibility in 1981 with Smash Palace. It's a breakup and divorce film a la Kramer v.s. Kramer, only as if it were directed with the bloody hands of Sam Peckinpah. Donaldson has a new film out, The Bank Job, a traditional heist film. Based on a true-life 1971 Baker Street bank robbery in London, it stars Jason Statham as Terry Leather, and Saffron Burrows as Martine. Terry is a low-level criminal who's trying to get out of that life for the benefit of his family. Martine is an old flame who brings the idea for the job to Terry, who puts together a small team: (clip). Two or three subplots weave around the heist story, involving British government officials, American black militants, and prostitutes. At first it seems disparate, but all the threads eventually weave. And things immediately begin to change for the heisters, as they dig their tunnel to the bank. (clip)
The gang were called The Walkie Talky Robbers in the press because they used radios to communicate with their lookout who was posted across the street. Robert Rowlands, a ham radio operator picks up the signals and notifies the police who begin patrolling all banks in a ten mile radius. (clip) And soon it's not just the police who are looking for the bank robbers. But I won't reveal more, because that's only the beginning of a fantastically plotted, smooth paced movie. I really enjoyed The Bank Job. It presents the period details with flash, is able to take multiple story lines and bring them convincingly to conclusion. The direction, editing, writing, and acting are evocative. The Bank Job is solid.


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