The Italian Job (2003)
Directed by F. Gary Gray
Charlie Croker pulled off the crime of a lifetime. The one thing that he didn't plan on was being double-crossed. Along with a drop-dead gorgeous safecracker, Croker and his team take off to re-steal the loot and end up in a pulse-pounding, pedal-to-the-metal chase that careens up, down, above and below the streets of Los Angeles.
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What critics say influenced The Italian Job
Not exactly a remake per se, but based on the concept of the original 1969 film starring Michael Caine, “The Italian Job” is a fun popcorn action flick.
But do yourself a favor and resist The Italian Job, a lazy and in-name-only remake of 1969's G-rated Michael Caine heist pic.
It's the equally apropos tagline of The Italian Job, a slick, star-studded remake of the 1969 caper about a gang of jewel thieves out to avenge the death of their double-crossed accomplice, and while they're at it, steal back $35 million in ill-gotten gold bullion.
If The Italian Job seems familiar, it's not simply because it's a remake of a 1969 British caper flick.
Crisp, uncluttered and wildly playful, the new film The Italian Job -- a remake of the 1969 film -- sweeps along like Buster Keaton's The General.
The Italian Job is an update of the 1969 classic of the same name but unlike recent remakes it is fresh and thoroughly entertaining.
Mark Wahlberg wouldn�t exactly be the first choice to replace Michael Caine�s original role, but that didn�t stop Jonathan Demme from trying to dopplegang Cary Grant with Wahlberg in his Charade remake, The Truth About Charlie, or Tim Burton in Planet of the Apes.
The gold heist in Venice at film's opening leads to the most lifejacket-gripping, gondola-tipping speedboat chase since Geoffrey Reeve's 1970 thriller, Puppet on a Chain.
Crisp, uncluttered and wildly playful, the new film The Italian Job -- a remake of the 1969 film -- sweeps along like Buster Keaton's The General.
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In that spirit, among the recent crop of heist films, The Italian Job is better than Frank Oz's The Score and David Mamet's Heist , but not nearly so good as James Foley's Confidence .
The Italian Job has occasional busts of smart dialogue ("There are [thieves] who steal to enrich their lives, and ones who steal to define their lives"), but not enough to elevate it to the level of David Mamet's most recent caper movie, Heist .
Despite the resounding failure of Gus Van Sant's Psycho, it at least had the whiff of an understanding of itself as shade and the filmmaker as ghoul.
Can someone knock him in the head with a stump before he moves on to the lead in "Citizen Kane"?
Like the thieves they feature, director F. Gary Gray ("A Man Apart," "The Negotiator") and writers Donna Powers & Wayne Powers ("Valentine," "Deep Blue Sea") have lifted the car, the traffic jam and some of the same basic plot from the Hollywood vaults for their remake of the film that naturally arrives with the same moniker.
But it's directed with some grace and snap by F. Gary Gray (of the excellent Set It Off, the lackluster if shrewdly cast The Negotiator, and the failed Vin Diesel entry A Man Apart earlier this year), with dialogue by Donna and Wayne Powers that sounds as if they had some laughs while typing it.
The intricacies and unforeseen snags of the plot are at least as exciting as the car chases, and the fact that Gray ( "The Negotiator" ) embraced -- even enhances -- this fact is part of what makes this film the first real cineplex stand-out of the summer.
Director Gray ("Friday," "The Negotiator") zips the action along like his patriotically painted Minis and there's some nice chemistry to be had between Wahlberg and Theron (Norton's performance, however, borders on the bored).
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There's no arguing with its professionalism and, at times, it threatens to hear the music, but when its best moments are those in which Donald Sutherland--in Venice again after 1973's Don't Look Now--summons up the horrific ghosts of Nicolas Roeg films past, the picture reveals itself to be inspired only by movies that were first, and better.
I even had the ambiguous pleasure of seeing Donald Sutherland (a very tall man) preparing his role for the remake of The Italian Job (hence the ambiguity) at Campo San Barnaba.
Saying that this new Job is a better job than A Man Apart is faint praise since just about anything this side of Roberto Benigni’s Pinocchio is better than A Man Apart.