Review of Tower Heist (2011) by Storytellershannon M — 15 Jun 2012

This comedy heist film has an impressive cast with Ben Stiller as the main star but also includes Alan Alda, Tea Leoni, Eddie Murphy, Matthew Broderick, Gabourey Sidibe and Casey Affleck. It's a fun heist film with some surprisingly good scenes and focuses around a group of high class tower employees who find out their pensions have been mismanaged by one of the big tenants of the tower. A group of them decide to rob the big tenant's safe and that's pretty much the rest of the story. There are alternative endings but I think I liked the bittersweet one they gave to the Ben Stiller character at the end. Murphy got a lot of acclaim in his role as the two timing thief who reluctantly offers to help the others rob the tower. Alda did a wonderful job as the overall antagonist of the picture. It's a fun picture that definitely was influenced by Occupy Wall Street following.

The budget was $75M (after tax rebates) and it made a bit over $152M at the Box Office. It was conceived as early as 2005 when Murphy pitched it as a group of men played by black comedians who do a heist at Trump Tower. It was filmed almost entirely in New York City and the high rises were supplied by Donald Trump.

HUMOR: B; HEIST IDEAS: B plus; STORY/PLOTTING: B to B plus; CHARACTERS/DIALOGUE: B plus to A minus; WHEN WATCHED: early June 2012; OVERALL GRADE: B plus.