Review of Small Time Crooks (2000) by Roy P — 10 May 2007

Any upcoming release of a new Woody Allen film is exciting, and ?Small Time Crooks? was certainly no exception. After all, what could be better than the acclaimed director doing a crime movie?

A lot it turns out. The film features a wannabe-crook, Ray (played by Allen), who has come up with the seemingly brilliant scheme of leasing a restaurant for his wife (Tracy Ullman) to use as a cookie shop. Meanwhile, Ray tunnels under the shop in order to rob a nearby bank - all the while with his criminally inept friends by his side. Not surprisingly, the team fails in the attempted robbery, but all is not lost. It turns out that Ullman makes a killing with the cookie business and the couple is soon rolling in money.

This is where the movie starts to lose it. We meet up with Allen and Ullman reaping the benefits of their cookie franchise, now in the form of a fake documentary, or ?mockumentary.? Unfortunately, nothing about the couple?s lives is at all interesting, leaving the viewer feeling like they accidentally turned on the Biography channel to a show dedicated to a ?famous? horse whisperer. Allen and Ullman go through the standard ?ups and downs? of marriage, none of which are particularly unique. Hugh Grant is introduced as the asshole trying to steal Ullman?s riches, a plot that is so overdone in Hollywood that even Grant?s pretty face can?t make it work.

While the first segment of ?Small Time Crooks? is definitely amusing, the last half of the film isn?t even worth sitting through. This is one Woody Allen movie that?s okay to miss.