Christian Gudegast
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As Den of Thieves‘s first shot, an overhead view of the rain-soaked streets of Los Angeles, gives way to the scene of an armored-car robbery that goes awry because of a trigger-happy thief, one may wonder if the film is more than just an homage to Heat , but also a copy-and-paste job.
'Heat'-lite.
The intricate double storyline is an obvious knockoff of the one in “Heat” (with a distant echo of “The French Connection”), and for roughly 45 minutes of the film’s 2-hour-and-20-minute running time, “Den of Thieves” is sturdy enough to earn the comparison.
Time has not been kind to Gudegast’s film: Den of Thieves is such a dumb misunderstanding of the genres in which it plays, such a loud, interminable shart of unmitigated machismo, such a heavy-handed rip-off of Heat and The Usual Suspects and even Ocean’s Eleven (and maybe even The Fast and the Furious, but for scumbags) that it feels anachronistic on arrival, the kind of melodramatic, pulpy studio action flick that doesn’t get made anymore because it shouldn’t.
“Den of Thieves” rips several hundred pages out of the Michael Mann “Heat” playbook.
It’s a blatant Michael Mann knock-off, homaging Heat to the point of borderline plagiarism, and its complicated heist plot has shades of films like Inside Man and The Usual Suspects.
The execution in these moments is thrilling, although muddied by a final plot twist that slavishly apes “The Usual Suspects.”
Finally, there's a twist ending that makes the one in The Usual Suspects seem credible by comparison.
But there’s another movie whose influence hovers over this one: Bryan Singer’s “The Usual Suspects.”
Time has not been kind to Gudegast’s film: Den of Thieves is such a dumb misunderstanding of the genres in which it plays, such a loud, interminable shart of unmitigated machismo, such a heavy-handed rip-off of Heat and The Usual Suspects and even Ocean’s Eleven (and maybe even The Fast and the Furious, but for scumbags) that it feels anachronistic on arrival, the kind of melodramatic, pulpy studio action flick that doesn’t get made anymore because it shouldn’t.
“Den of Thieves” may not be as moody as “To Live and Die in L.A.” or as clever as “The Usual Suspects,” but it works well on its own terms.
It’s a Heat rip-off, but not a gonzo one like Den of Thieves, which was anchored by the uncontainable charisma of Gerard Butler, Pablo Schreiber, and the sneakily effective O’Shea Jackson Jr.
At under two hours, however, the pulpy entertainment is welcome, including a bevy of twists that recall the recent (and slightly better) Den of Thieves .
They decide to use their skills to take down scores, giving this a Heat vibe at times, although thematically it's probably closer to Den of Thieves - albeit better.
Think of Christian Gudegast’s delightfully scuzzy Den of Thieves crossed with the epic L.A. grandeur of Michael Mann’s Heat, peppered just a touch of the nihilism found in S. Craig Zahler’s Dragged Across Concrete and you’re mostly there.
Wrath of Man might not end up with a reputation like Heat, but it’s likely to have a fate more like that of Den of Thieves, the 2018 L.A.-based cops-and-bank-robbers film that emerged as a cable and later a Netflix staple.
It’s no Heat , or The Limey , or Destroyer , but it’s not too far from Den Of Thieves in terms of its cheap, muscular thrills: a dual track of Statham’s solo investigations and a rag-tag team planning a heist.
Finally, I really did love the actual heist, and while the sequence doesn’t compare to the one in Rififi , there are at least elements of it that do deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as that 1955 classic.
“Den of Thieves” starts off promisingly, with an atmospheric heist scene reminiscent of Michael Mann films like “Heat” and “Thief.”
(It really makes you appreciate how unique Mann is.) Shorter and sillier and Den of Thieves could have been a fun heist flick like Point Break.
Cobbling together pieces of many a similar effort, London Has Fallen screenwriter turned first-time director Christian Gudegast must hope the audience won’t notice he’s borrowing so liberally from everything — from Heat and Point Break to The Usual Suspects and The Driver, actually.
Training Day (2001)
Directed by Antoine Fuqua
influenced Den of Thieves (2018)
Plot Visuals Characters Themes
It’s a film that wears its inspirations openly, with a whole lot of “Training Day,” “Rampart,” “The Usual Suspects” and “Inside Man” in the mix.
Visually, Gudegast is hovering somewhere between the digital inkiness of Collateral and the sun-blasted urban apocalypse of Training Day.
Butler plays Big Dick like he's half Pacino from Heat , half Denzel from Training Day , a tattooed super-detective who isn't above shedding a little bit of blood in order to make the streets a safer place.
I’m all for grungy, teeth-punching police thrillers (Training Day/End Of Watch), but only given something remotely plausible to work with.
Since the film is desperately trying to be something akin to Training Day, but also an Ocean's Eleven rip off, it plays its action in this weird middle ground between gritty realism and bombastic gun fights.
He goes full “Training Day” — OK, half “Training Day” — for a heist thriller about ruthless cops hounding after murderous bank robbers.
It’s particularly noticeable in writer-director Christian Gudegast’s feature, because the actor is playing a gangsta-style law enforcement anti-hero who gives Mickey Rourke in “Year of the Dragon” a run for the money for sheer repellence.
Time has not been kind to Gudegast’s film: Den of Thieves is such a dumb misunderstanding of the genres in which it plays, such a loud, interminable shart of unmitigated machismo, such a heavy-handed rip-off of Heat and The Usual Suspects and even Ocean’s Eleven (and maybe even The Fast and the Furious, but for scumbags) that it feels anachronistic on arrival, the kind of melodramatic, pulpy studio action flick that doesn’t get made anymore because it shouldn’t.
Since the film is desperately trying to be something akin to Training Day, but also an Ocean's Eleven rip off, it plays its action in this weird middle ground between gritty realism and bombastic gun fights.
Cobbling together pieces of many a similar effort, London Has Fallen screenwriter turned first-time director Christian Gudegast must hope the audience won’t notice he’s borrowing so liberally from everything — from Heat and Point Break to The Usual Suspects and The Driver , actually.
The unusual deaths cause grizzled leather-clad ‘Big Nick’ (Gerard Butler, who’s borrowing Liam Neeson’s hair dye from Taken ) greater intentions to hunt down the elusive gang, using his own questionable methods to get results, borderline-illegal manoeuvres that are championed by his mostly anonymous group of supportive cop allies.
It’s a blatant Michael Mann knock-off, homaging Heat to the point of borderline plagiarism, and its complicated heist plot has shades of films like Inside Man and The Usual Suspects.
It’s a film that wears its inspirations openly, with a whole lot of “Training Day,” “Rampart,” “The Usual Suspects” and “Inside Man” in the mix.
It splits the difference between the pulp pop art of Inside Man with Heat ’s epic tragedy and fails to satisfy the audience like the former or tell a tale as powerfully as the latter.
The intricate double storyline is an obvious knockoff of the one in “Heat” (with a distant echo of “The French Connection”), and for roughly 45 minutes of the film’s 2-hour-and-20-minute running time, “Den of Thieves” is sturdy enough to earn the comparison.
It wants to be a modern-noir crime drama in the vein of Michael Mann, but though director Christian Gudegast—taking up the camera after writing such movies as London Has Fallen and A Man Apart —has the chops to approximate Mann, he does not have the style to do something interesting with his homage.
For proof, look no further than “Den of Thieves,” the new film from screenwriter Christian Gudegast (“A Man Apart” & “London Has Fallen”), making his directing debut here.
Christian Gudegast, writer of A Man Apart (2003) and London Has Fallen (2016), makes his directorial debut with Den of Thieves , and it’s everything he’s been building toward as a creator of generic, testosterone-driven crime dramas that offer nothing new.
Following in the footsteps of Michael Mann’s 1995 classic Heat (not to mention coming quick on the heels of John Hillcoat’s Triple 9 released last February), director Christian Gudegast, the screenwriter behind London has Fallen and A Man Apart making his directorial debut, attempts to revitalize the cops and robbers melodrama with the testosterone-filled action-thriller Den of Thieves.
But the hulking, permanently disheveled Butler is no Pacino, Gudegast, the screenwriter of such previous gems as London Has Fallen and A Man Apart , is no Mann, and Den of Thieves is decidedly no Heat .
Thankfully, he confirmed that I was, in fact, fully sane and that a film directed and co-written by the man who wrote A Man Apart and London Has Fallen is a quality product not despite Butler’s presence but in large part because of it.
Time has not been kind to Gudegast’s film: Den of Thieves is such a dumb misunderstanding of the genres in which it plays, such a loud, interminable shart of unmitigated machismo, such a heavy-handed rip-off of Heat and The Usual Suspects and even Ocean’s Eleven (and maybe even The Fast and the Furious, but for scumbags) that it feels anachronistic on arrival, the kind of melodramatic, pulpy studio action flick that doesn’t get made anymore because it shouldn’t.
Merrimen plans to rob the LA branch of the Federal Reserve, and Nick—otherwise beset by classic Bad Lieutenant (a phrase uttered perhaps unironically in this film) vices like drug abuse and alcoholism, etc., as well as a wife (Dawn Olivieri, last seen as “wife” in Bright) who wants to divorce him because he’s a horrible person—wants to stop that theft from happening.
There’s a whisper of Abel Ferrera’s Bad Lieutenant in so many scenes you’d think that director’s finger was on the trigger.
It’s the same plot of Mad Money , a comedy with Diane Keaton, Queen Latifah and Katie Holmes released 10 years to the day before Den of Thieves.
At times, the film feels like a grimy and mean cop drama in the vein of the better David Ayer films, while other sequences in the movie feel a bit more light-hearted and exciting in the style of The Italian Job or a Fast and Furious movie.
Visually, Gudegast is hovering somewhere between the digital inkiness of Collateral and the sun-blasted urban apocalypse of Training Day.
More successful were “Olympus Has Fallen” (2013) and its sequel, “London Has Fallen,” two unabashed “Die Hard” knockoffs that turned Butler into a beefier, shaggier Bruce Willis.