TAKERS (Blu-ray)
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment

Release date: February 7th 2011
Certificate (UK): 15
Running time: 106 minutes

Director: John Luessenhop

Voice cast: Matt Dillon, Hayden Christensen, Chris Brown, Paul Walker, Idris Elba, Michael Ealy, T.I., Zoe Saldana, Johnathon Schaech, Jay Hernandez

As far as heist movies go, there have been some great ones over the years. The Asphalt Jungle (1950), Inside Man (2006) Reservoir Dogs (1992) and the original versions of The Italian Job (1969) and Ocean’s 11 (1960) all remain memorable for their approach to handling stories which essentially remain the same. Most recently Christopher Nolan took the idea and ran with it for Inception (2010) where the scene of the crime was the mind rather than a bank vault. I wondered if Takers would have something new to add to the genre.

In the movie we have a group of professional bank robbers who specialise in high concept robberies. Dressed like a modern day version of the Rat Pack with designer suits, bowler hats and cigars, Gordon Cozier (Idris Elba), John (Paul Walker), A.J. (Hayden Christensen), and brothers Jake (Michael Ealy) and Jesse (Chris Brown) have just finished a bank job, escaping in a news helicopter and later on we see them enjoying the fruits of their hard, hard labour. Good for them.

Their former leader, Ghost (T.I.) has just been paroled and proposes one final heist, a $25million job, but with only 5 days to put it all together they have to work fast. Meanwhile, two detectives, Jack Welles (Matt Dillon) and Eddie Hatcher (Jay Hernandez) are hot on their heels and it all culminates in an inevitable finale where the guys would be lucky to walk away with their lives than with the payoff they were expecting.

Those familiar with the genre will find the archetypal plot firmly in position here. We follow the guys as they plan the job and then execute it but then we watch as their plan unravels; betrayals are revealed and the stakes become higher when survival becomes more important. The movie for the most part is well cast; Matt Dillon, Hayden Christensen, Paul Walker, Idris Elba and Zoe Saldana do a good job despite a screenplay which is slow moving and lacking in depth and insight.

As for the special features, Executing the Heist: The Making of Takers features the cast and crew talking about how the movie came together and what it was like working with each other. Matt Dillon and Paul Walker are also interviewed.

Take Action! is also worth a look. It focuses on the action sequences as special effects. Luessenhop talks us through how the helicopter explosion was set up and how they managed to get the shot of the cast walking in the foreground of the burning helicopter. Another complex sequence involved two trucks falling into a hole in the middle of the street in Los Angeles after an explosion. Planning the shot, camera angles and performances are talked through.

So, to come back to my original question, “Does Takers add anything new to the genre?” the answer would be a resounding no, but that’s not to say it might not be a fun movie to watch with your friends, if only to hear Chris Brown say “It’s almost as if… he wanted me to shoot him.”