The Good Thief (2002)

THE GOOD THIEF IS SEMI GOOD
Nick Nolte has had his share of ups and downs recently. His run in with the law, battles with his own personal demons and an unflattering mug shot that made its way to the net.
But none of this should be taken into consideration when viewing his work. Sporadic and filled with highs and lows, his new movie falls somewhere in the middle.

The movie tells the story of an expatriated American living in France. An addict and aging thief whose turn to gambling, which has led to a losing streak, Nolte is approached for one more job, a huge score to settle down with. With nothing to lose, he accepts the challenge and must put together a way to get the job done.

The job? A casino in Monte Carlo, its vault filled with over $80 million also features a series of paintings, priceless classics by the masters. But the paintings on display are copies, the real treasures kept in a private vault a few miles away. The job is to make it look like the casino is being robbed when in actuality, it is the paintings being stolen.

Nolte puts together his crew and gets things started. At the same time his character is on good terms with a local police detective (Tcheky Karyo). The pair talk openly with one another, Karyo making sure that Nolte is aware if he commits a crime he is going away for good. Their friendship and mutual respect for one another is a key element in Nolte's plans.

Crosses and double crosses are found throughout. A young immigrant that Nolte takes under his wing becomes a pawn in the game as one of his men falls for her, revealing the plans. She in turn gives the information to a snitch Karyo has planted. The same information is presented to the man who brought her here, a pimp with a grudge against Nolte.

The movie is a bit slow paced, taking it's time to get to the main thing the viewer is looking for, the actual crime. What goes on there is interesting and capable of inducing sweat on the palms of most moviegoers. But unlike most heist pictures, it doesn't rely on this, instead falling back on the essence of character driven stories. We sit and watch as the character of Bob (Nolte) is played out, his addictions, his manipulative mind, all leading us one way but finding it is misdirection. The police detective who is caught between a certain amount of respect for and at the same time desire to capture a criminal. And the whole hosts of other characters that litter this film, from members of the heist team to the street people who are involve in Bob's life. It is this slow paced look at the man behind the criminal that makes the movie interesting. The heist is just icing on the cake.

That being said, keep in mind that this is not a movie for everyone. If you are used to a quicker paced more action oriented heist picture like say THE ITALIAN JOB, then this movie isn't for you at all. If a steady forward moving tale that takes a deeper look at its characters is more your type, then you might enjoy this one.

Far from Ocean
Another heisty film on a heist in a casino on the French Riviera of course, in Monte Carlo to be more precise. That sounds like the Ocean gang, or Ocean's band , but it is not. Though the idea is the same, the cops are all ready to get the upper hand, but it all goes to the dogs because one sexually ambiguous gangster is afraid of some spiders and this leads the cops to leaving the Casino per se. So the safe is emptied and the boss who has been playing all the time wins big, real big, but his gang loses and it is the small youngish others who win. The world is no longer what it used to be. Apart from that the film lacks the humor Ocean has and the very hostile world that really plays it as a game and not as a war. But apart from that it is an acceptable entertainment though it will not change the face of the world nor the color of the moon.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine & University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne

The Occaisonally-Not-Bad Thief
This remake of Jean Pierre Melville's Bob le Flambeur (Bob the Thief) feels like an excuse for an actor's holiday in the splendid South of France, but it's a pretty sour trip.

Nick Nolte plays Bob, a Cote d'Azur gambler who's in the death spiral of a heroin-fueled losing streak. Offered a chance at redemptive and profitable thievery, he cleans up and assembles his multi-national coterie to enact the heist.

There are a dozen retread sub-plots: a buddy cop who's wise to Bob's scheme; a teen-aged prostitute he's trying to save; a side-kick who can't keep himself out of trouble; etc, etc.

The film strings together two disparate genres, and they're uncomfortable bedfellows. It's half lightweight heist caper, and half redemption of the tortured soul (in its drug-addict variation). We end up with method actors doing farce, mumbling through jokes and flattening mannerisms.

Nolte is everybody's first choice to play an unsuccessfully-rehabbing, badly-aging bohemian. When we're shown a picture of Nolte in his youth, we realize just how beaten up he is.

His voice sounds like wind in dry rock bed, and cracks above a whisper. He looks like he's been marooned in a desert.

Neil Jordan, the writer/director, chose to modernize the story by giving his Bob a heroin addiction. Why does "tortured" in movies always means "drug-addicted?" Why not give Bob a slight eating disorder, like most middle-aged men have, stuffing themselves at the refrigerator at night in quiet desperation?

The movie finds itself in its last twenty minutes, when Nolte's dry-heat finally subsides and the wastrel teenager is allowed to be a girl.

Jordan bestows a patch of kindness on his characters that offers them, and us, some needed relief.