Armored
Starring:
Matt Dillon
Jean Reno
Laurence Fishburne
Amaury Nolasco
Fred Ward
Milo Ventimiglia
Skeet Ulrich
and Columbus Short as Ty
I've always been rather fond of heist-gone-wrong style movies, I've always found them to be significantly more entertaining than their close relation the prim, proper 'look at how clever I am' heist movie. I don't know about yourselves but I always find more enjoyment in watching a group of people attempt to think their way out of a situation off the cuff. Armored, a film about a rookie van security man called Ty who is convinced to go along with his veteran colleagues and steal forty two million dollars from their own vans.
Sounds like a simple enough exercise doesn't it? Drive the two vans to a disused industrial plant, hide all the money, report a fake heist and then torch the vans. Sounds simple enough doesn't it? A plan that will work perfectly as long as absolutely nothing goes wrong at all, nothing like say - a bum sleeping in the building they plan to use for example. That kind of thing just can't happen, someone is bound to have swept the building before they use it right? Wrong.
From here things spiral rapidly out of control thanks to a combination of hot heads, cold guns and Ty's conscious - resulting in a situation where Ty is locked inside one of the vans with the rest of the crew trying to either coax him out or pry the doors open.
The cast is a pretty great one, there are plenty of names here from films I've enjoyed in the past and on the whole they perform admirably, Lawrence Fishburne is solid as the itchy trigger finger guard Blaine, Jean Russo and Matt Dillion are as good as they always are and Amaury Nolasco provides more of the charm that made me like Sucre (Prison Break) so much.
The movie is fast paced and filled with tension throughout, there's a little action but it's far more low-key than most movies of it's type. And that's something you could almost accuse the film of being, it's a little too low-key; the plan is pretty weak and the characters aren't adaptable enough to have contingencies. When things go wrong they're left scrambling - which is part of the charm - but don't expect any huge sprawling fights, extended gun play, rooftop races or anything you might have come to associate with heists. In
Now as much fun as the movie itself is I was a little disappointed with the ending, I found myself wondering at numberous times how badly Ty was going to 'get it' at the end, because no matter his change of heart once murder was committed and no matter his honourable background/dependant brother/rookie status; he did agree to go along with this plan, without really looking into the details of it either. He kind of deserved more than he ended up with. It's a minor quibble really, but as the last thing you take away from a movie is it's ending - it could have been stronger.
Jean Reno
Laurence Fishburne
Amaury Nolasco
Fred Ward
Milo Ventimiglia
Skeet Ulrich
and Columbus Short as Ty
I've always been rather fond of heist-gone-wrong style movies, I've always found them to be significantly more entertaining than their close relation the prim, proper 'look at how clever I am' heist movie. I don't know about yourselves but I always find more enjoyment in watching a group of people attempt to think their way out of a situation off the cuff. Armored, a film about a rookie van security man called Ty who is convinced to go along with his veteran colleagues and steal forty two million dollars from their own vans.
Sounds like a simple enough exercise doesn't it? Drive the two vans to a disused industrial plant, hide all the money, report a fake heist and then torch the vans. Sounds simple enough doesn't it? A plan that will work perfectly as long as absolutely nothing goes wrong at all, nothing like say - a bum sleeping in the building they plan to use for example. That kind of thing just can't happen, someone is bound to have swept the building before they use it right? Wrong.
From here things spiral rapidly out of control thanks to a combination of hot heads, cold guns and Ty's conscious - resulting in a situation where Ty is locked inside one of the vans with the rest of the crew trying to either coax him out or pry the doors open.
The cast is a pretty great one, there are plenty of names here from films I've enjoyed in the past and on the whole they perform admirably, Lawrence Fishburne is solid as the itchy trigger finger guard Blaine, Jean Russo and Matt Dillion are as good as they always are and Amaury Nolasco provides more of the charm that made me like Sucre (Prison Break) so much.
The movie is fast paced and filled with tension throughout, there's a little action but it's far more low-key than most movies of it's type. And that's something you could almost accuse the film of being, it's a little too low-key; the plan is pretty weak and the characters aren't adaptable enough to have contingencies. When things go wrong they're left scrambling - which is part of the charm - but don't expect any huge sprawling fights, extended gun play, rooftop races or anything you might have come to associate with heists. In
Now as much fun as the movie itself is I was a little disappointed with the ending, I found myself wondering at numberous times how badly Ty was going to 'get it' at the end, because no matter his change of heart once murder was committed and no matter his honourable background/dependant brother/rookie status; he did agree to go along with this plan, without really looking into the details of it either. He kind of deserved more than he ended up with. It's a minor quibble really, but as the last thing you take away from a movie is it's ending - it could have been stronger.
Armored is out on general release in both DVD and Bluray formats on 31st May.
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