Den of Thieves - upcoming crime thriller with Gerard Butler (UPDATE: Saw it tonight, it's great!)

shadow_priest_x said:
Well the keyword is ARMED robbery.

I'm talking about movies that involve hold-ups. Basically if your movie involves a small crew of well-trained thieves in masks with automatic weapons, and the target is a bank or armored car, then it's going to be called a Heat imitator/knockoff/ripoff. Even though Point Break did it before Heat did.
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Fair enough but then it isn't such a broad genre so a comparison to Heat might be justified.
 
FierceRedBelt said:
Fair enough but then it isn't such a broad genre so a comparison to Heat might be justified.
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Like I said earlier, comparisons are inevitable but it's not like Heat invented the sub-genre or was the first one to do a lot of the shit that it did.

To go back to Point Break, would we have even gotten Heat if Point Break hadn't come out a few years earlier? Who knows, but it's hard to believe that PB didn't influence Mann at all. But you don't hear anyone saying, "Ahh yeah, that Den of Thieves, the Point Break ripoff."


point-break-movie-poster-1991-1020291357.jpg
 
I just read that Den of Thieves is tracking to make about $15 million this weekend, slightly ahead of expectations.
 
shadow_priest_x said:
I intend to go check it out tonight. If it's at least a 6 then I figure I can live with that.

Probably go see this tonight and then see 12 Strong sometime in the middle of the week.
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Glad you liked DoT , definitely agree that it got quite a bit of hate for what it is. Also 12 Strong was good, 2 hours flew by once they got into the meat of the movie which was early on. Lots of very nicely filmed scenes.
 
Someway, critics need to be held accountable for giving shill reviews to movies. If all the regular folk think this film is good, then no way these paid pros can see this movie badly. What metric are they using that regular folk dont consider?

Obviously this is not Oscar material, but it never meant to be, and not advertised as such. What are these harsh critics expecting?

Shill reviews are like slandering. It can really affect the performance. It is like someone open restaurant, but competitors pay critics to can it. Not very fair.
 
TKing said:
Glad you liked DoT , definitely agree that it got quite a bit of hate for what it is. Also 12 Strong was good, 2 hours flew by once they got into the meat of the movie which was early on. Lots of very nicely filmed scenes.
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Yeah, I think your score of 6/10 is a little low. I know you said you are a strict grader, but even so, I think a 7/10 is the lowest it deserves.

I'll go check out 12 Strong probably either Tuesday or Wednesday. That's been my pattern ever since I got MoviePass, go see one movie over the weekend and then another sometime mid-week.
 
MadSquabbles500 said:
Someway, critics need to be held accountable for giving shill reviews to movies. If all the regular folk think this film is good, then no way these paid pros can see this movie badly. What metric are they using that regular folk dont consider?

Obviously this is not Oscar material, but it never meant to be, and not advertised as such. What are these harsh critics expecting?

Shill reviews are like slandering. It can really affect the performance. It is like someone open restaurant, but competitors pay critics to can it. Not very fair.
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I suspect at least some of it has to do with the fact that critics watch movies for a living, which means they watch a SHITLOAD of films every year. I once heard that a professional critic will usually watch somewhere betwen 150 and 250 new movies a year. By contrast, I watched 61 new movies in 2017 (i.e. movies that were made in 2017) and that's easily the most new films I've ever watched in a given year. So I think that critics are so desperate for something that feels new and different and that gives them something they feel like they've never seen before, that they're eager to give bad marks to any film that feels derivative or un-original.

What's confusing here though is that, while Den of Thieves did employ a some well-worn conventions, I thought it DID feel like a pretty fresh take on the heist genre. Certainly there were elements that I had seen before, but the film still felt like an interesting enough take on heist films that it held my attention.

But even more than that, it's just a fundamentally well-made film. Good performances, good cinematography, an effective score, great action scenes, and, perhaps most importantly, a coherent story.
 
This movie has been done at least 3 times before. So by today’s standards it’s pretty original.
 
shadow_priest_x said:
I just got back from this one and it is damn good!

We've seen heist films before and this movie does recycle some common tropes, but it does it so well and does it in ways that feel new and fresh. I was locked in from beginning to end and never felt bored. If you think this is just going to be some generic crime thriller with Gerard Butler and 50 Cent then you're wrong.

The cast all does a good job, though at the end of the day, this really is Gerard's movie and everybody else is just living in it. He turns in a great performance--one of the best performances of his career, no doubt--as the slightly unhinged cop, husband and father who is married as much to the job as he is to his wife.

The action, when it occurs, is also stellar. From the opening theft of an armored truck to a shoot-out in the finale, it is all expertly executed. But the film really is not as much of an action film as the trailers might have you believe. It is a character-driven story about two groups of men on opposite sides of the law, all of whom are rugged and hard-edged and on a collision course toward each other.

Having now actually seen the movie, I cannot BELIEVE the RT score is as low as it is. It makes no sense to me at all. The majority of the critics must have had their heads so far up their asses that they couldn't see the screen well enough to understand what they were watching. I just don't get how someone could watch this film and come away feeling like it's not well-made.

At least some of the critics know what's up though. A few positive quotes:







Personally, I'm giving it an 8/10. I suspect it won't do great financially, but I really hope I am wrong about that. Everyone involved deserves for this to be a success.

@VitorReem, @Dusty Rhodes, @Strychnine, @BayAreaGuy, @Dragonlordxxxxx, @DeepCover, you guys expressed some interest in this one. Y'all should definitely give it a look.
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Thanks. Good to hear that you liked it.
 
It's a pretty decent heist action flick. I feel like they could have cut down the movie length though. The pacing is quite slow for an action movie. Also, the family part could have been done without, since I don't feel like it gave the characters anymore depth or has relevance to the main plot.

7 out of 10
 
Orgasmo said:
It's a pretty decent heist action flick. I feel like they could have cut down the movie length though. The pacing is quite slow for an action movie. Also, the family part could have been done without, since I don't feel like it gave the characters anymore depth or has relevance to the main plot.

7 out of 10
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Like I mentioned earlier, I think it's ultimately less an action movie and more of a character piece. Everyone's been comparing it to Heat, and if you remember, Heat was actually somewhat slow-paced itself.

I enjoyed the family stuff and thought the scene with the divorce papers was one of the most memorable scenes in the whole film. It helped us to understand just how on-the-edge Gerard Butler's character really is.

Glad you enjoyed it overall though.
 
MadSquabbles500 said:
Someway, critics need to be held accountable for giving shill reviews to movies. If all the regular folk think this film is good, then no way these paid pros can see this movie badly. What metric are they using that regular folk dont consider?

Obviously this is not Oscar material, but it never meant to be, and not advertised as such. What are these harsh critics expecting?

Shill reviews are like slandering. It can really affect the performance. It is like someone open restaurant, but competitors pay critics to can it. Not very fair.
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I'm torn on this because if it's "obviously... not Oscar material" it shouldn't get a high score. The body of the review should acknowledge it's a thrill ride that doesn't try to be portentous or take itself too seriously.

Something like: Enjoyable afternoon popcorn flick you should see this year. 6.5/10
 
FierceRedBelt said:
I'm torn on this because if it's "obviously... not Oscar material" it shouldn't get a high score. The body of the review should acknowledge it's a thrill ride that doesn't try to be portentous or take itself too seriously.

Something like: Enjoyable afternoon popcorn flick you should see this year. 6.5/10
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Wait, are you saying that if someone is not an Oscar kind of movie that it should have a score ceiling, regardless of how well it's made?
 
shadow_priest_x said:
Wait, are you saying that if someone is not an Oscar kind of movie that it should have a score ceiling, regardless of how well it's made?
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I have no clue what an "Oscar kind of movie" means.

I assumed that film excellence award show. And what I meant by that was that if the film wasn't made to break new grounds in content or excellence while still being enjoyable it should be rated accordingly.
 
FierceRedBelt said:
I have no clue what an "Oscar kind of movie" means.

I assumed that film excellence award show. And what I meant by that was that if the film wasn't made to break new grounds in content or excellence while still being enjoyable it should be rated accordingly.
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That doesn't answer the question. You said:

. . . if it's "obviously... not Oscar material" it shouldn't get a high score.

So why don't you explain this statement?
 
Pugilistic said:
I'll check it out when comes out on home media. I like Butler but ever since I saw 50 cents acting in Southpaw, I'm not sold on any movies where he plays a prominent role.
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Youre missing out because hes more like the strong silent type. very little dialog, its more of the main villain and butler which both are excellent
 
shadow_priest_x said:
That doesn't answer the question. You said:

. . . if it's "obviously... not Oscar material" it shouldn't get a high score.

So why don't you explain this statement?
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I assumed that film excellence award show. And what I meant by that was that if the film wasn't made to break new grounds in content or excellence while still being enjoyable it should be rated accordingly.

^That's about the best explanation I can give.

The oscar quote was taken from @MadSquabbles500 post. What do you want me to explain specifically?
 
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