The Italian Job - A Must See!

This is one my favorite movies of all time, and I'm excited to write about it. The Italian Job, as I said in the previous post, revolves around a group of thieves that work together to pull of a death-defying, outrageous heist in the city of Venice, Italy. The camera pan of the boardwalk throws the viewer right into the setting, and begs us to enjoy the beautiful city of Venice. F. Gary Gray makes this shot with his wide angle views, as well as with the close-ups of both Sutherland and Wahlberg.

The film begins with a shot of the Venice boardwalk from which we are introduced to John Bridger (Donald Sutherland) and Charlie Croker (Mark Wahlberg). Bridger makes a phone call to his daughter, Stella, played by the stunning Charlize Theron. He is first shown exiting a jewelry - where he just bought a beautiful necklace for Stella.

The next few scenes Charlie's crew examines the heist, bit by bit, in order to ensure it's correct and can be executed with perfection. Each member has his own duty within the crew. Handsome Rob (Jason Statham) is the wheelman, Lyle (Seth Green) is the computer genius, Left Ear (Mos Def) demolitions and Steve (Edward Norton) is the all around player. The director, F. Gary Gray, adds a lot of cuts into this scene - cutting from character to character, allowing the viewer to really get a sense of urgency from the film.

Later in the film, Charlie Croker introduces the crew by giving the viewer a background story of how they got their start in the "business".

Our imaginations are blown when the crew actually pulls off the heist - which is the stealing of a large safe full of gold bars from armed men. Handsome Rob (Statham), with the help of Lyle's (Green) programming skills, pulls their boat into the target garage. Meanwhile Steve (Norton) "paints" explosive paint underneath the safe on the 3rd floor. The explosives cause the safe to fall through the floors above and into the water below the boat. With the decoy safe in place, Handsome Rob takes off in the boat - this is one of the greatest boat chase scenes - right up there with James Bonds' escapade in Moonraker. Check it out on Youtube!

Meanwhile below the surface, Charlie and John crack and empty the safe. This ends what is known at "the Italian job" and the scene quickly turns to the crew, all celebrating with champagne, debating over what they're going to buy with their share of the gold. Each of them want a specific item, but Steve (Norton) is unsure - he just wants "one of everything you guys said". Then the crew mounts up and takes to the mountain roads in Northern Italy to make their escape complete. However, they are stopped shortly thereafter by men in trucks who work for Steve. Not only does he take all the gold for himself, he back stabs his so-called best friends by killing one of the crew. *I won't give away who, so watch the film to find out!*

The scene in which the crew is debating over what to buy, you are given an insight into each character's personality. Handsome Rob (Statham) imagines himself driving brand-new Aston Martin Vanquish which allows us to see where his priorities stand - in his image.

Handsome Rob, Charlie, John, Lyle and Left Ear are dumped in the ice cold water below, shot at by Steve and left for dead. Obviously the majority of the crew survives, vowing revenge for the death of their friend - they hunt down Steve at his Los Angeles mansion.

Their goal: retrieving the gold. With your best interest in mind, I refuse to go any further with the summary. Although I will say this - 3 astonishing MINI Cooper S cars are used, by the crew, in the next job.

In my opinion this film has been a star vehicle for each and every actor/actress that starred. Mark Wahlberg plays a go-getter who isn't afraid on anything....and the viewers are let into a character that is quite different from his more recent roles in The Departed and Max Payne. As for Charlize Theron, she is magnificent - with her driving abilities (I think) to her witty personality throughout the film, she adds that extra spark to the screen. Edward Norton is one of my favorite actors, partly because of this film - he plays a snide, ignorant human being who is only out for himself. However, he does it with class! No other actor can pull off this kind of role with the abilities of Ed Norton - a sheer genius.

Overall I think you can tell that I enjoyed this movie - it's one that you can just throw in the DVD player and watch as many times as you want. You can't say that about many films!

Thanks for reading! Hope you go out and rent this movie (or buy it at WalMart for $5 like I did).

Director: F. Gary Gray
Writers: Donna Powers - derived from the 1969 screenplay by Troy Kennedy-Martin






For those of you haven't seen the original - check it out! Here's the poster.....starring Michael Caine