Heist (2015)

one of my absolute favorites!

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

This is ultimately a movie about the very bad things that can happen when we don't address our unease, when we just try to brush it off, whether that's to fit in or to preserve our self-image.

If you want to watch a really great movie this is not a good choice. However for DeNiro fans and those who like action movies it was a good enough movie. I liked a lot of the acting and some very interesting characters with good motivations but the plot line was all over the place like a map drawn with a cocaine line. There was too much drama over load and not enough suspense caused by better plot. Too much violence that seemed to try and make up for holes in the plot. Casino crime is interesting so the premise is good but it just does not play out well. The number of story lines is distracting and it just seems fictional because it's such a basket of randomness.

I've read this was direct to DVD. It deserves it. A really great cast is wasted. There's a moving bus and the people getting thrown out of it are obviously dummies. (Insert director/writer joke here) If a director doesn't have grasp of technical issues, like what's a take and what isn't, things can go south very quickly. There's also totally ridiculous turns of events here, like a whole gang of police being fooled by the clever use of a hoodie and people deciding to kill someone who works for them instead of just telling them to knock it off. The movie also telegraphs it's big twist. I knew right away what was going to happen, although by the time the movie got to it, I had already forgotten about it and sort of said 'Oh, yeah, that's it'. It's just really bad and the only reason I gave it a 3 is out of pity for the cast. I don't know who Scott Mann is but somebody should think long and hard about giving him the keys again.

In the intro two guys are being enhanced-interrogated by some guy. He wants to know who stole the $10k. Then the boss arrives and gives one of those villain speeches about his rules and why he can't have people steal money from him. The two don't end up well.Some guys in clown masks are running. They stop and hijack a bus.Now we are taken a week earlier. We meet a long-time casino employee named Vaughn. He's got a daughter with cancer who needs surgery but he has no money and the hospital is about to kick her out. He's got a few days to come up with the money. He tries to talk to Pope, the casino boss from the intro. But Pope recites the rules that the business is not a charity. Vaughn insists but gets himself beaten up by Pope's sidekick. Cox, a recent casino employee is watching all this attentively. And one night approaches Vaughn with a plan to steal money from the casino. Of course Vaughn isn't interested at first but changes his mind once he's out of options.Cox's plan involves two other guys. He has realized that once a week a guy shows up in the casino and purposely loses a ton of money every time. A couple of days later another guy shows up every week who always wins at the roulette. Clearly the casino is laundering money, which means if they steal it, Pope isn't going to go to the police. Cox's initial plan is no good so Vaughn suggests they go in a specific time a guard goes on coffee break, kill the lights for some reason, and walk into the vault for which he has the codes and then just walk out. Cox insists on bringing weapons, Vaughn protests in vain.The day of the heist the gang makes it into the vault and grab the money but on their way out the guard is back so they shoot him. The lights going out alerts the bad guys of course so they are watching out. And when they see our three guys a shootout ensues. That causes the fourth guy waiting outside in the car to leave in a hurry.So now we're back at the beginning the with the guys running on the street and hijacking the bus. For some reason one of them shoots his pistol in the air. That catches the attention of a cop parked nearby. Now the chase is on.On the guys was shot and needs assistance. Vaughn starts talking to the cop and since he sounds reasonable, she believes him and helps him out. In turns out Cox is pretty out of control so Vaughn is indeed the reasonable one looking out for the bus passengers, who include a pregnant woman, a vet student, an Asian kid, and a guy in a beaver suit. There are some others as well but we don't learn anything about them.Meanwhile Pope's sidekick is researching and going after the guys on his own to get the money back no matter what. Pope warned him not to get Vaughn's family involved. We learn that Pope has cancer and wants to leave the business to his only daughter. But she wants nothing to do with the corrupt affair.In charge of the police operation is a young hotshot detective who also seems to be willing to do any unorthodox thing to stop the bus which is now heading to Texas followed by news choppers and cops. Along the way of the movie there are a couple of neat surprises.There seems to be a lot of hatred for this movie, not sure where that is coming from. Heist is a perfectly enjoyable heist/escape&chase movie. It benefits from a very strong cast: Morgan is always likable, De Niro, who frankly hasn't put much effort in his acting in a long time, actually does give it a try. Bautista, who hasn't had a lot of experience does have a lot of potential and this role is well-suited for him. Carano has always had trouble with her voice-acting but is starting to improve little by little. Perhaps the greatest surprise was Gosselaar, who hasn't had a chance nor has he tried to show some acting chops, does very well and projects some charisma. And the story worked for me overall. Sure, the final surprise which you do so coming moments before is a bit too much because it assumes some astonishing level of planning. But nevertheless, Heist is a strong good-hearted (is that what bothers people about it?) action thriller. It's not high on wild action and massive destruction as most action movies are these days. The actually heist isn't filmed so well and only takes a few moments. That would have been a perfect opportunity for a thrilling scene. It does have a good message though, that even the bad guys can occasionally do something good for others and that things aren't black or white but there's lots of gray in between.

Not sure how much they paid DeNiro to make this VERY amateurish movie, but he can't save this generic, lame, dopey thing. Putting a couple of wrestlers in major acting parts is bad enough, but the writing is at a middle school film project level. That includes the plot, the dialog and the almost random killings throughout. The story at the very basic level is kind of interesting, but totally butchered in the execution. Here are a few idiotic examples. 1. A casino dealer who does a card trick at the table?, then just yells "dealer change" over his shoulder and walks away. Later we see this same dealer wheeling a money cart into the vault, also NEVER done by dealers. This writer has obviously never even been in a casino lol. 2. A guy tells off the owner and gets fired, but his alarm code to the vault where they keep millions in cash still works the next night. 3. A veterinary student is put in charge of caring for a bad guy that got shot, they bargain for medical supplies, one of which is a hypo full of something. She asks the cop who brought it what it is, he says "pain killer" so based solely on that she injects the entire thing in the IV and the guy dies. Then the other bad guys get mad but are not sure who to blame or whatever, just too dumb to put any effort into trying to figure it out. 4. Two words, SWAT motorcycles, wtf? I could go on for days, please save yourself the irritation and skip this thing, unless you want your head to hurt from the stupidity and horrible acting. Shame on you DeNiro!