The Bank Job (R-2008)

"The Bank Job" of the title is only half the story. "The Bank Job" follows the true story of a bank heist which uncovers a world of deceit and corruption in the power circles of 1971 London. After Martine Love (Saffron Burrows) is caught transpoting drugs in the airport, Tim Everett (Richard Lintern) offers her a way out. He tips her off to a bank job that he wants her to arrange in order to get the contents of a safe deposit box. She turns to her old flame, Terry Leather (Jason Statham), a small-time criminal, for help and he begins to put a team together. The first half of the film involves the creation of the team and the planning of the heist and is a very straight-forward heist movie. Once the heist is in play, though, the criminals find they have opened a pandora's box that reaches into the very heart of law enforcement, organized crime and even into a "black power" group. The movie opens sort of disjointedly, with characters weaving in and out that have no relatonship to each other. As the heist approaches, the story becomes a litte more linear, focusing mostly on Terry and his gang. Once the heist goes down, the film ties all of the loose ends introduced earlier in a frenzy of double-crossing and violence as these disparate groups try to protect the secrets this gang of thieves may or may not have uncovered. Once this gets going, it becomes a riveting story of sex and corruption that shakes the power circles of London for years to come. While much of the interplay between the characters is probably fictionalized, much of the ramifications are documented. Jason Statham does a great job carrying the bulk of this movie, which is a departure from a lot of the senseless action movies he is accustomed to.

Grade: B



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