$ (1971)

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

Don't listen to the negative reviews

best movie i've ever seen.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

This complicated and tortuous story of a big bank heist in Germany begins slowly. I think "slowly" is the right word,, although maybe "impenetrably" would be more apt. At any rate I couldn't figure out what the hell was going on. It's clear early on that extremely handsome Warren Beatty is a bank security specialist and Goldie Hawn with the enormous blue eyes of a child's doll are in cahoots to rob some illegal money. Maybe.The lead may be deliberate but the pace picks up during the crime itself and practically goes apoplectic during the lengthy climax, which does not involve a shoot out, Gott sei dank, but only pursuits on foot, by car, and on trains. The running that Beatty alone does would give me a heart attack in a few minutes, and never mind the ancillary dangers. Speaking of heart attacks, Scott Brady looks seriously at risk. He has a raspy New York voice, a ruddy complexion, jerky motions, lanky hair, and he seems to sweat gallons.It's a longie, but it's probably worth watching. The performances are all appropriate and up to professional standards except one (Robert Stiled as an unconvincing US Army major). Gert Fröbe is memorable and the lascivious bank manager. Brooks has directed with style -- efficiently and without memorable touches.

In Dollars, clever bank-security guy Warren Beatty teams with a kooky call girl (Goldie Hawn) to steal from three disparate criminals, who have each chosen to store their ill-gotten gains within the bank's safe-deposit boxes. Beatty's Joe Collins is cool and methodical, and Hawn is a true delight as Dawn Divine, although the movie suffers from a lengthy run time and an ending that seems sort of a meaningless afterthought.Collins works for a bank in Hamburg, Germany that is on the cutting edge of technological security. Among other things, the bank has - get this! - a 24-hour closed-circuit camera inside its safe, the better to monitor would-be evil-doers. Much is made of this awesome camera. Kind of makes one pine for the days when security cameras were a new thing.At any rate, Collins and Divine have picked out three nefarious marks - a corrupt sergeant (Scott Brady), a Vegas mobster (Robert Webber), and a drug dealer (Arthur Brauss) - each of whom has deposited dirty money into a safe-deposit box in the bank. These boxes are much as they are today, although the bank employees very pointedly do not get to see what is in them; privacy, you see, is a big selling point for the bank wishing to attract more and more foreign interests.The plan is to move the monies from the three boxes to Divine's own safety box. Plenty of planning goes into this, and it culminates with a wonderfully tense scene in which Joe, trapped in the safe, attempts the exchange. It's only a matter of time, though, before the various baddies discover what's happened, and there's a long, long chase scene - mostly on foot! - that eats up a chunk of film near the end of the movie.Hawn is at her giggly, risqué best (this would be during her Laugh-In days), and Beatty stays true to type as the Man with the Plan, the cool cat. I particularly enjoyed how anxious Hawn's Divine is at her own role in the heist - for a phone call she must make, she has her lines written out longhand, and yet she still can only whisper them to the bank's manager, played by Gert Frobe (Auric Goldfinger).The ending felt like it was lacking something, perhaps some panache or some cohesion. It's almost as if someone woke up in postproduction and realized there was no actual climax and then hastily wrote one in. In fact, after reading a synopsis on IMDb, I wondered if I'd seen the same ending - interestingly, the IMDb synopsis made even less sense than the one I saw.Finally, there's the issue of the editing and/or direction - the former was too choppy, the latter too rapid. When your movie features an intricate plan, maybe it's best not to rush through every step, forcing your viewers to keep up. Even when we could keep up, it seemed as if some plot elements were missing entirely, leading to many questions left unanswered.

I enjoyed this film, but cannot understand why this would be classified as a comedy. I saw it on TV and the announcer said it as a comedy, and on this site it is listed as a comedy, as well as under crime and drama. It is a crime drama, but not a heavy one. It is light and has its amusing moments, but I found that the scenery was also very interesting.The chase scene was great, except it was a bit unbelievable, as the man with the suitcase running away from the crooks never seemed to get tired. He was like a super athlete.Worth seeing, but do not expect a comedy. As a drama it works well.

American banking engineer, orchestrating the opening of a high-tech new bank in Germany, conspires to rip-off a gang of crooks and low-lifes who keep their loot in private boxes at the branch. There is quite a long set-up to the protracted chase in this film; luckily it involves a daffy, wonderful Goldie Hawn as a hooker/accomplice to thief Warren Beatty. Hawn is a living, breathing cliffhanger, you never know what she's going to do next. In the middle of the hysteria, there's a beautifully modulated moment where she tells Beatty about a screen-test she did for the movies ("First take, nothing. Second take, I dunno know...tears. Third take, I forgot my own name. And I made it up myself!"). The chase takes up about two entire reels, and it's been edited with hairbreadth timing. I also loved what first appeared to be a twist ending: someone dupes someone else, and then in turn gets duped. It would've been an awesome climax, but there's a weird tag at the very end of the picture (ostensibly to wrap it up with a bow) which is sort of a letdown. It seems to involve none of the participants--only their props!--which leads me to believe this was a post-production/last minute decision. Still, "$" (pronounced "Dollars") is funny, smart, and filmed in a cool, jazzy style that is no longer fashionable but certainly memorable. ***1/2 from ****