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  Directed by
  Starring
  Specs
  • Widescreen 1.78:1
  • 16:9 Enhanced
  Languages
  • English: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround
  Subtitles
    English - Hearing Impaired
  Extras
  • Theatrical trailer

Heist

Roadshow Entertainment/Roadshow Entertainment . R4 . COLOR . 104 mins . M15+ . PAL

  Feature
Contract

Quick, someone made a crime movie called The Score. Let’s cash in. Where do we start?

Let’s begin with the cast.

They have Robert De Niro, who do we get? Hmm, someone old, grizzled, gruff, with a steely gaze and authoritive command. There’s only one man for the job, Gene Hackman. Oh, yeah, that’s a good choice. That guy is perfect for the steely gaze, the gruff talk and the angry bits. He’s a mean sonofabitch and looks old and grizzled. He’s even played a submarine commander who wanted to nuke Russia. I heard he wasn’t acting though. Next, they have Marlon Brando. Who would be a good match for Brando? This could be hard a hard one. The guy’s a legend. We need someone fat. Someone bald. Someone like... Danny DeVito! Of course, it’s brilliant, sheer genius! He’s like a Mini-Me version of Brando. And the best bit is you can understand what he says. Lastly, the Edward Norton part. Ah, simple one this. Delroy Lindo. Norton’s a skinny white guy, so we get a big black guy. And just to make sure, we’ll throw in another guy with a beard. They never would have thought of that!

Now for the story.

They have a guy who wants to get out of the biz. No problem, ours has to get out of the biz. They have a cocky young guy who wants in on the job. Fine, we’ll have a cocky and stupid young guy who has to be part of the team. And we’ll give him a moustache. Hehe, brilliant, just brilliant! They have a fence who needs the money from a final job to pay his debts. We’ll have a fence who won't pay up for the last job unless the team does a final job. Okay then, now for the final job. They have one final job for a big payoff that will let everyone settle their debts and move on with life. Sounds good. We’ll have a final job as well then. Ours will involve robbing a plane. Damn! I deserve a foot massage for that stroke of genius. And now the most important bit, they have a big twist at the end. Good idea. But why have one twist when we can have two? Hell, why have two when we can have six twists?! Who cares, whenever anything happens, it’ll have a twist. Someone goes to the toilet? Wrong! Throw in a twist. Someone gets mad? Wrong. Throw in a twist. The audience will think we’re being so bloody clever. They’ll be guessing the whole way through. They’ll say “Oh, I know what’ll happen now... damn, I didn’t see that coming! Clever bastards!”

It’s looking good. Now all we have to do is get a someone to write and direct. They had Frank Oz direct The Score. He did a pretty good job, you know? But the guy’s more famous for Muppets. So we get the natural enemy of the Muppet – David Mamet! We can have lots of yelling and swearing, and they’ll say “Oh, that’s Mamet. He’s a potty mouth! You should see Glengarry Glen Ross. He made Jack Lemmon swear!”

Let’s see Kermit the Frog do that!

Finally, so people don’t think we’re copying The Score, we’ll call ours The Heist. Better yet, let’s drop the “The” and make it just Heist. They needed two words. We only need one. It sounds cooler. Excellent.

Well done lads, job finished, let’s wrap it up and ship it out.

  Video
Contract

A very nice looking picture, just shy of being very crisp with a slight softness to the finest detail. This makes it look a little more filmlike in a way, so it’s not a bad thing at all. Colours are restrained, as is the lighting at times, with a grim look to a lot of the story, but it is a moody, grim style of story where the sun rarely shines. They’ve worked from a nice clean source as well, with buckleys in the way of nicks, hairs, scratches etc etc to draw your attention away from the story. Theatrically released in a 1.85:1 aspect ratio, on this DVD it’s framed at 1.78:1 and like all good DVDs it comes with 16:9 enhancement to make the best use of that beautiful widescreen telly sitting in your lounge.

  Audio
Contract

A single audio track, in English of course, in Dolby Digital 5.1 at 448kbps. We’re off to a good start so far, and this should be pretty sweet to accompany the nice picture, yes? Well, yes, but a little bit no as well is the actual case. For the most part everything sounds fine. Dialogue is mostly good, although there are some hard to hear bits and a little harshness in the upper ranges when someone really shouts - but still it's fine. The front soundstage is good, broad at times, with a nice full sound. But the rears are very under-utilised. Still, I can live with that. There’s good opportunity for them to work a bit harder, but they just sit back there and don’t do much. It is a Mamet film though, and not a Michael Bay film, so the focus is going to be on the front and the characters' dialogue. What I noticed most, however, in some scenes, I wont say which, it just sounds like the original sound was mixed really half-arsed, with limp effects to gunshots and the like. One certain scene just doesn’t sound right, and that stuck in my mind. I’m taking a point off for that, because even my wife picked it, and if she hassles me about it, then someone has to pay.

  Extras
Contract

A trailer. Can you deal with that? It’s a nice trailer, but as far as extras go, it’s a lame package. Even Corky Romano got better than this, and that film blew chunks.

  Overall  
Contract

So they went and made the film, and what was the result? Is it better than The Score? Well, it’s a bit of a mixed bag, with much going for it, yet much holding it back. In the end, I’d call it a draw. The acting is mostly good, there’s plenty of snappy to-and-froing, but the twist after twist is not always a positive thing. Some story resolution is a bit forced and seems tacked in for the sake of wrapping it up, but then there are some nice elements to the story which give it the edge over the occasional bloated egofest that The Score sometimes lapsed into.

As for the DVD, a general thumbs up with regards to the A/V quality, although a slightly tilting thumb when it comes to the audio deficiencies I’ve noted. Extras get a thumbs down, because a trailer just doesn’t cut it for the bonus hungry animals in the world today.

Greedy bastards aside, if you want a film which tackles roughly the same turf as The Score, has a lot going for it and makes for a fairly entertaining view, then Heist makes the grade if you can forgive its lamer moments.


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      And I quote...
    "Heist tackles the crime caper style of The Score and gives it a good run for its money."
    - Vince Carrozza
      Review Equipment
    • DVD Player:
          Sony DVP-525
    • Receiver:
          Sony STR-DB1070
    • Speakers:
          Wharfedale s500
    • Centre Speaker:
          Polk Audio CS245
    • Surrounds:
          Wharfedale s500
    • Subwoofer:
          DB Dynamics TITAN
    • Audio Cables:
          Standard Optical
    • Video Cables:
          standard s-video
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