Stealing Las Vegas (2012)

That was an excellent one.

Good concept, poorly executed.

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

If not for some (incredibly, albeit minimal) surprise twists in the finale, Stealing Las Vegas is just a High School project remake of Ocean's Eleven.Sure there's some female nudity and a spark of violence, but other than that this would've worked better on a stage in front of an assembly of kids.While trying to throw too many plot points into a simple story of a robbery, Stealing Las Vegas just shows the plight of injured knee Nick and his PC-multi-race gang trying to get past basically one door in a failing Casino to nab twenty million from their clichéd bad casino boss.I would hand it to these young (and old, sorry, Eric Roberts) kids by remaking Ocean's Eleven on a shoestring budget. But, their heart was hardly in it. Sure, they went through the motions and said and did what the script/director told them to do, but barely did I believe any of this world existed. Or, their performances.In the days of Blockbuster Video past, if the Ocean's Trilogy was all rented out, I'd still recommend picking a different film or genre. Not worth anyone's time.

Fun ensemble casino caper heist with Eric Roberts at his sleaziest since Star 80. His casino boss character takes pictures of his "conquests" and with each flash of his camera, my subconscious registered Paul Schneider shotgun blasting Dorothy Stratton in Star 80 and I cringed with genuine fear and disgust. The cast of Stealing Las Vegas is full of exciting up-and-comers, but the true "find" is Antonio Fargas aka Huggie Bear from TV's "Starsky & Hutch." Fargas is simultaneously menacing and sage, and the viewer is never quite sure which side he's on. The same can be said for Elloy Mendez's Jorge who should be a star already. He's that darn good. With more twists and turns than a Six Flags rollie coaster, this indy is worth a look.

You can tell some of these people are new actors. Not too sure about the producer and his "writing", seems more like stealing already done ideas. Action / Fighting scenes are really BAD. Not sure if its the new actors or production of how it was made, but probably some of the worst fight scenes I have ever seen. (very scripted)The strip club scenes are way over done and seemingly pathetic attempt to grab the male viewers attention that has wondered off during some of the cheesy action scenes.Ending is surprisingly good, but has been done before. Actors over all did a good job for being fairly new.

Solid enough acting, et cetera; plot resembles other films to some degree, but end and message are unique; 'especially nice is that the fascist exploitation(the bad guy has a thing for taking photos of people for unsavory reasons, that much of a plot-spoiler I throw in for possible motive to watch: exploitative people generally are evil, but those types are bottom of the barrel). Hopeful sentiment(the poor can vanquish the greedy/evil) is one all to need to consider. The actors are generally unknown, and all skilled enough to consider "good"; the writing is decent(the topless/stripper stuff feels like extra baggage, but is not too-excessive); the direction has some fascinating angles/choices; the low scores given by reviewers seems bizarre.