Armored (2009)

This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Armored is the story of a broke security guard who is tempted into joining a staged hijack in order to loot money. No successful heist takes place without a hiccup or two, and in this movie as well, the surprise element is rather funny is what i would call. To imagine, there would be no movie plot,if the hijackers weren't seen stashing the money is a bit far fetched to say the least.What follows is a series of events,which are predictable to say the least.It is a bit sad to see established actors like Jean Reno (of Leon the professional) and Laurence Fishbourne resorting to such low budget flicks.Its almost as though,they are broke themselves :) There is some pretty bad acting in the movie,with half the characters portraying a confused and uninterested attitude. Matt Dillon is the only person who stands out. It is safe to say, that this movie would have been a disaster without him. On the whole,with a run time of a little under 90 mins,this is not a bad watch at all.

Heist movies can be good (see: "The Italian Job") and bad (see: too many to list), but they can also be neither. This one is right about in the middle. With a lot of filler, boring dialogue and cringe-worthy hinge-popping, it's just a bore. The five minutes dedicated to "action" at the end weren't nearly enough to justify watching. But the exposition into Jimmy's artwork and school attendance was great. I don't understand why they couldn't have delved into that more. Maybe when the bad guys go to the house to pick up Jimmy he's actually at school and so they have to come up with another plan. Why didn't Ty just leave in the cop's car? Oh well, at least I was able to write enough sentences for it.

In this heist-gone-wrong thriller, Columbus Short plays Ty, an Iraq War veteran who's now working for an armoured transport security company. He's trying mightily to provide for, and supervise, his troubled kid brother Jimmy (Andre Kinney), and adding to his problems are the debts & two mortgages their parents weren't able to resolve before they died. Considering that he could be about to lose the brother to foster services, and the house to the bank, Ty ultimately agrees to help his co-workers in the theft of a whopping 42 million dollars. Co-worker Mike (Matt Dillon) promises him nobody will get hurt, so Ty reluctantly gets on board. Of course, many of us have seen movies like this before, so we can guarantee that this supposedly clever plan is not going to go well. Clearly the guards didn't think it out too well, and their actions become more depraved, and the blood starts flowing. Whatever flaws there may be in the script, it's made up in part by capable direction by Nimrod Antal ("Kontroll", "Vacancy") and superb pacing. The movie is still action-packed, suspenseful, and compelling in its consistently ugly way; we go from liking these guys and sort of hoping that they might pull this off to detesting them and hoping that they get whats coming to them. The worst of the bunch is the impulsive, trigger happy Baines (Laurence Fishburne). Ty's not the only one with something of a conscience, but the members of the team find their time is short once their guilt starts getting to them. Dillon fares best as the heist planner who goes from being charismatic to being an out-and-out psycho; he's fun and in fine form. The cast also includes Skeet Ulrich, Amaury Nolasco, Milo Ventimiglia, Fred Ward, and a rather wasted Jean Reno. Basically this is grim stuff that at least succeeds on a visceral level, but that conclusion is too ridiculous to believe. Seven out of 10.

Here's the thing. This movie is not great. The character development is lacking and the story is fairly simple. However, I felt that the acting was quite good and the dramatic elements of the plot came through nicely. In an era of special effects in the place of content, this was a refreshing change of pace. There were a lot of things that could have been added that would have made this a much better film but overall I came away with a positive feeling. Giving the characters more depth and more motivation would have been helpful as well as showing us a few more aspects of their lives and what compelled them to come up with their plan. Also, a few of the actors were too young for their roles (they were supposed to be friends with the leads father but were actually his age.) Still, this was a lot better than some of the other drivel that passes for "action/thriller" movies these days.