Tower Heist (***)

Ben Stiller plays Josh, the hotshot in this movie. You can tell he’s a hotshot because the movie has one of those hotshot sequences, wherein the character is introduced with a bunch of quick cuts, fast talk, and a bunch of other characters greeting him (rarely her), imploring him, interrupting him, and so on. Also, the movie takes place in Manhattan, where all movie hotshots reside. Josh is a residential building manager in charge of all the other employees who make the lives of the wealthy residents easier. In particular, they make the life of Arthur Shaw (Alan Alda) easier. Shaw is a big-shot investor, and when he turns out to be a fraudster too—think Bernie Madoff—the big shot and the hotshot become enemies.

Their decision to become criminals is slightly more believable than in Horrible Bosses (which was produced by this film’s director, Brett Ratner), but the execution is much less so, since that comedy reminds us that most criminals, let alone dilettantes, aren’t good at it. Here, the defrauded workers turn, too easily, into some kind of Ocean’s Eleven. Cowriter Ted Griffin wrote the screenplay for the 2001 version of Eleven, so that makes sense.

Call this Stiller’s Six, counting his costars Eddie Murphy, Matthew Broderick, Michael Peña, Casey Affleck, and Gabourey Sidibe. Murphy, recalling his earliest roles in Trading Places and 48 Hours, plays the petty thief recruited to aid their plan. The comedy is about average (“don’t talk to me for the rest of this robbery” is one of Stiller’s lines). The heist is pretty ridiculous, but it has some great visuals in which the tower comes into play.

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viewed 10/12/11 at Ritz East [PFS screening] and reviewed 10/12/11

Double Hour (***1/4)

This quasi-romantic Italian thriller begins with a woman in a Turin hotel room. When the maid comes, the woman tells her to come in and makes a comment about her hair. But the guest, who commits suicide, is not the main character; the maid is. This minor deflection of our attention presages the plot as a whole, which begins with a meeting at a speed-dating session. The gentleman who most intrigues the woman, a security guard, seems kind but distant, and an unlikely tragedy seems to end the romance just as it begins. The unusual, contradictory events that follow are satisfactorily, yet unsatisfyingly, explained by a plot twist that may be guessed by some. And then there is a smart third act, which recontextualizes clues from the second. It becomes clear before then that we really don't know about either of these characters. And so the thrills exceed the romance. If it were a novel, it’d be a page turner, though.

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viewed 5/24/11 at Ritz 5 and reviewed 5/25/11

Pistoleros (**1/4)

A whole mess of Danish gangsters double-cross and kill each other over a cache of cash hidden after a botched heist…as told to a couple of aspiring Copenhagen filmmakers. Director Sparky Gonzalez comes off as a low-rent Guy Ritchie (Snatch, Revolver), though with some spaghetti western touches, like the soundtrack. Without Ritchie’s sense of style, and a script that’s less clever than convoluted, the whole thing comes off as contrived.

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viewed and reviewed 4/4/08; screened at Philadelphia Film Festival.

Ocean’s Thirteen (***1/4)

The best of the summer’s three-quels reunites most of the earlier cast (notably excepting Julia Roberts), adds Al Pacino and Ellen Barkin as a swindle-worthy hotelier and his sidekick, and comes up with a plot that, unlike #2 (Ocean’s 12), allows a sufficient showcase of its ensemble cast’s talents. The setting returns to Las Vegas. Pacino is supposed to have cheated Elliott Gould’s Reuben, perhaps causing the latter’s heart attack. Thus the motive is revenge, not mere greed. All the better to allow you to root for the debonair cast led by George Clooney, with Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, et al thrown in for good measure. Soderbergh lays out their plot so well that its execution is nearly anti-climatic.

(reviewed 6/15/07)

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