Review of Henry's Crime (2010) by Thomas W — 30 Sep 2011

Forgettable and predictable ... Henry's Crime is nothing special and nothing new. Keanu Reeves (The Matrix, Parenthood, The Devil's Advocate) plays a loyal and dependable every-man named Henry who volunteers to help a friend "play a softball game" as the team is one man short.

The softball game ends up being a bank robbery ... and Hank, as the getaway driver, doesn't get away. Keeping his mouth shut -- even though EVERYbody knows that he is practically innocent of any wrongdoing -- Henry "does the time" for the "crime" he committed.

While in prison, he meets a wisened and comfortable lifer played by James Caan (The Godfather, Honeymoon in Vegas, Elf), who teaches Henry a few lessons on life. When Henry's time in the slammer is up .

.. he returns to his ho-hum existence until he stumbles upon a "secret tunnell" that leads directly to the bank's vault he supposedly robbed. And since he's alreayd "done the time" he might as well commit the crime.

Caan is eventually paroled and together Henry and him set about setting up the bank robbery heist while moonlighting as fellow actors in a nearby theater. Vera Farmiga (Up In the Air, The Departed, Source Code) plays an over-the-top actress who is let in on the plan and she stirs up a relationship with Henry (as his wife played by Judy Greer [Elizabethtown, 13 Going on 30, Adaptation] left him while he was in prison for one of the actual bank robbers .

.. although that secret is unknown to her [give her some credit]) and Peter Stormare (Fargo, The Big Lebowski, Armageddon) plays their eastern European director. Once everything is set into motion ... there is no real need to watch the rest of the film as you can piece it all together on your own (if you've seen at least 3 different bank robbery movies).

There is a decent cast here to be sure; but they aren't given anything new to work with. Keanu plays the honest guy who didn't snitch, Caan is the wise mentor and Farmiga and Greer play underwritten, stereotypical archetypes of random women.

I didn't hate this movie ... and you can sit through the entire thing; but there is no real need to do so. This is one I will have to re-type into IMDB just to remember what it is in a couple of month's time.