Heist

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Heist (2001)

Heist:

A heist movie (as you can guess from the title) from David Mamet. The plot provides constant twists and turns but maybe it did so too well. By the later part of the movie, you're pretty much expecting yet another twist to be thrown in so there were no longer any surprises. The more significant negative for the movie was that the actors seemed as though they were reading their lines for the first time. Surprisingly, these are some of the best names in Hollywood including Gene Hackman, Danny DeVito, and Delroy Lindo. This must have been one of the rare bad performances from each of them. Also, they really didn't have that great of a dialogue to work with either, which is surprising coming from David Mamet. Some of the dialogue really sounded rather strange to me. See the following excerpts:

JOE MOORE: What made you a criminal?

BERGMAN: Nothing made me a criminal; I am a criminal.

What was that response supposed to mean? Perhaps Mamet was trying to say that nothing made him a criminal, he was born a criminal. The dialogue just sounds like it's running in circles.

BERGMAN: Everybody needs money. That's why they call it money.

Makes no sense at all. So they call it money because everybody needs it? That's like saying: Everybody needs water. That's why they call it water.

PINKY: He's so cool... when he goes to bed, sheep count him.

So sheep count him... why does that make him cool? Sounds a bit too manufactured to me.

JOE MOORE: I'd try to imagine a fellow smarter than myself. And then I'd try to think "What would he do."

Duh... Personally, I'd try to imagine Brian Boitano and then try to think what he would do. (Thanks South Park)

I think David Mamet should concentrate on his story first before worrying about how he's going to make the dialogue sound "cool." If he'd have gotten someone to maybe refine his script a little, it might have turned out better. As it is, the actors just didn't have much to work with.

-Tso