- Directed by Brett Ratner
- Starring Ben Stiller, Eddie Murphy, Alan Alda, Casey Affleck, Matthew Broderick, Téa Leoni, Michael Peña & Gabourey Sidibe
- Classification: M
- Runtime 104 minutes
WITH Eddie Murphy (Beverly Hills Cop) back again firing on all cylinders, this is a lot of fun and a very funny, action crime comedy. When a group of employees try to steal back $20 million of their pension fund hidden by their employer, the first thing they need is someone to tell them how to do it.
Written by Ted Griffin (Killers; Matchstick Men; Oceans Eleven), Jeff Nathanson (Catch Me If You Can) and directed by Brett Ratner (Red Dragon; Rush Hour 1, 2 and 3). While it takes a bit of time to get going, this action crime comedy, is tightly written with well defined characters, and perfect casting of those characters.
Josh Kovacs (Ben Stiller) is the manager of The Tower, a residential ritzy apartment building in New York. He’s close to all the tenants, especially Arthur Shaw (Alan Alda), a financier who owns the building. When Mr Shaw is arrested by the FBI for fraud, Josh thinks it’s all misunderstanding that can be quickly resolved. But he soon learns that the employees’ pension which he asked Mr Shaw to handle is gone. When a long serving doorman tries to kill himself, Josh’s take on Mr Shaw changes.
Mr Shaw lives in the penthouse apartment, and when Josh challenges him about the staff pension fund, he looses his temper and starts destroying Mr Shaw’s prized veteran Ferrari Shaw keeps in his office with a golf club, and gets fired together with two other employees with him. FBI special agent Claire Denham (Téa Leoni) in charge of the Shaw case tells Josh that Shaw might walk for lack of evidence and a very smart and expensive lawyer, and that recovering the pension fund is unlikely. She tells him that it’s rumoured that Shaw has $20 million hidden away in case of emergency.
With two other employees Charlie (Casey Affleck) the concierge and lift driver Enrique (Michael Peña), who have also lost their jobs, and an evicted tenant Mr Fitzhugh (Matthew Broderick) a failed financier, they set out to get into Mr Shaw’s penthouse to get the money. Josh, thinking he knows where the $20 million is stashed, so he bails out of prison Slide (Eddie Murphy) a local crim he sees being arrested on his way to work, and tells him of their loss and why they need him to tell them how to steal the money back.
Having found the safe where the money could be, it’s a bit out of Slade’s expertise to crack it. Luckily Odessa (Gabourey Sidibe) a maid still working at The Tower was taught by her father, a locksmith, how to open this type of safe. When Odessa opens the safe it’s empty. So where and in what form is Mr Shaw’s emergency funding stashed? Once found, now the problem is getting it out of the building.
Tower Heist is in cinemas December 26.
The Movie Hound’s Picks
- War Horse [M] (Three and a Half Stars – in cinemas December 26)
Beginning in rural England with a unique friendship between a horse called Joey and teenager called Albert, to breaks him in and trains him for a life he wasn’t born for. On the declaration of the First World War, Albert is heartbroken when Joey is sold to the Military. We then follow Joey’s progress through the war from the British cavalry, the German army pulling guns, the barn of a French farmer and his granddaughter, to the terrors of No Man’s Land’s barbed wire, and finally Albert, now old enough to enlist, meets up with Joey and brings him back to England. When Steven Spielberg makes a movie he certainly puts a lot into it, but at 138 minutes it’s long, and while it’s well paced, beautifully constructed and an exciting cinematic tearjerker, did it really need to be such a marathon?
- We Bought a Zoo [M] (Three Stars – in cinemas December 26)
A father Ben Mee (Matt Damon) moves his teenage son Dylan (Colin Ford) and young daughter Rosie (Maggie Elizabeth Jones) from the city to the countryside to re-open a zoo, all against the advice of Ben’s brother. While Rosie loves animals and is excited, Dylan is unhappy, missing his city friends, and takes it out on his father. Writer and director Cameron Crowe (Almost Famous; Jerry Maguire) has made some great movies, but this isn’t one of them. Still able to attract top talent, it’s too long, dripping in sentimentality, with too many clichés, and all covered in sickly sweet syrup. Billed as a family movie, this mixture of Hollywood stars, children and animals, will hit home with those who go to cinemas with a ready supply of Kleenex. Little Miss Maggie Elizabeth Jones is so cute, she distracts attention away from the movie’s faults.
Lotterywest (PIAF) Film Festival
The Kid with a Bike (Le gamin au vélo) [M]
- Written and directed by Jean-Pierre Dardenne & Luc Dardenne
- Starring Thomas Doret, Cécile De France, Jérémie Renier & Egon Di Mateo
- Runtime 88 minutes
- Four and a Half Stars
WHEN 11-year-old Cyril (Thomas Doret) is abandoned by his father and is placed in a state run home for children, he has two aims. Firstly to find his father and then find his bike which was left in the small flat they lived in. When the local hairdresser salon owner Samantha (Cécile De France) agrees to foster him at weekends, she reverses the order of his aims. Once Cyril has his bike back, they set off to find his father Guy (Jérémie Renier), who is working as a chef in a restaurant, but his father doesn’t want him, and that’s final. When Samantha says she’ll foster him full time, he finally accepts he’s far better off with her than his father.
Still a difficult and rebellious kid whose bike is his only possession and his passion, he’s soon under influence of the local drug dealer Wes (Egon Di Mateo), but when Wes sets him up to rob the local newsagent on his way to bank his takings, the newsagent and his son are left in the street injured, Wes abandons him. When will Cyril learn on which side his bread is buttered?
This film won the Grand Prix of The Jury at the Cannes Film Festival this year. Another feather in the cap of the Dardenne brothers (The Child; The Son; Rosetta) who wrote and directed it. Not forgetting their stellar cast, especially young Thomas Doret, and Cécile De France who both give fine performances. It’s a film that creeps up on you, a story of unselfish love, forgiveness and compassion that leaves you feeling somewhat inadequate.
The Kid with a Bike screens at the Somerville, January 2-8, and at Joondalup Pines, January 10-15.
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