Robert Mitchum's mournful hangdog face has never been put to better use than in this ironically titled downer from 1973.
This movie knows how to get down to business. It's a no frills crime story about how everyone is willing to turn on everyone else in the world of bank robbers and gun runners. Everyone's your friend when they've got something to offer you and no one's your friend when it's in your best interests to rat them out. Director Peter Yates and screenwriter Paul Monash resist the urge to provide a moral lesson or any redemptive arc, let alone a happy ending. This is a spare, bleak, and fiendishly entertaining example of the kinds of films the 1970s were known for.
It also boasts some bank robbing scenes that manage to be both low key and unbearably tense all at the same time.
Grade: A.
This movie knows how to get down to business. It's a no frills crime story about how everyone is willing to turn on everyone else in the world of bank robbers and gun runners. Everyone's your friend when they've got something to offer you and no one's your friend when it's in your best interests to rat them out. Director Peter Yates and screenwriter Paul Monash resist the urge to provide a moral lesson or any redemptive arc, let alone a happy ending. This is a spare, bleak, and fiendishly entertaining example of the kinds of films the 1970s were known for.
It also boasts some bank robbing scenes that manage to be both low key and unbearably tense all at the same time.
Grade: A.