The Bank Job

[Redstar]

Starring David Suchet "The Bank Job" is based on the true story of a robbery at Lloyds bank in Baker Street in 1971. Thieves got away with millions in money, jewels and safe deposit boxes. None of the stolen loot was ever recovered or the thieves caught. The news of the robbery was made subject of a government "D" notice. The scandal involved as the film blurb reveals, murder, corruption at high level and sex which may have involved a member of the Royal Family.



Listening to David Suchet (who plays a nasty character) on the radio yesterday it sounds like a good film, I hope it is in the class of "The Long Good Friday".



It is released at the end of February

[grillreaper]

that's right, the film also stars Jason Statham and Saffron Burrows. I think Statham was a good choice, he played a similar role in Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and proved himself. here he is going to play the main character.

I like the 70s feeling about the film, it's pulled quite well i think. here's a trailer

am a sucker for heist films, so am anticipating this.

[batman]

If Suchet is the baddie it might be worth a look .... he was tremendous as the evil hijacker in Executive Decision.



Bats.

[DocRobertPepper]

Ive alreday seen this before christmas at a preveiw showing at Cineworld Wandsworth

thought it was a good British crime/Blag film

based on a true story

recomended if you enjoyed Lock Stock etc

i may even go see it again when it comes out

[Redstar]

Looks good, it will make a nice change to see an all British cast (I assume it is) in a good crime caper.

[DocRobertPepper]

It was also written by Dick Clement & Ian La Frenais

[PaulPlowman]

The actual bank itself was a set on the Pinewood Studios backlot, which seems to have become semi-permanent, because they're hiring it out to other productions. I'm not sure if this is a common thing or not - I thought that nowadays they tended to pull sets down after filming...



Pinewood Studios - London Street Pinewood Studios - Backlots

[Frank63]

Also of interest if your a 'radio ham' , the films apparetly shows period Yaesu equipment and of course PYE handhelds ( all you could get in those days), it'll bring back happy memories to some of us.

[orpheum]

I saw it at the weekend.Whilst i thought it overlong and at times way off on the period detail nevertheless i thought it was an entertaining film,although not too happy about some of the OTT violence.

[grillreaper]

Saw it finally a few days ago. Overall a good performance from Statham.

i would say the film is satisfying, lots of action and fast paced. Big up for Donaldson, no disappointments here.

[Merton Park]

I enjoyed it, well worth seeing. Reasonably well acted, Jason Statham is good as is his wife in it, the girl from Ashes to Ahes. Good English cast, although I thought the robbery took place over an Easter weekend, but in the film it doesn't. Anyone else remember which is right?

[faginsgirl]

I enjoyed it too! But I do agree that it was too long, I think they could have really condensed the begining down a bit. We would have gotten the jist!



Fagins girl xx

[nandywell]

Right, well I've seen this film and I thought It was the biggest load of bollocks I've ever clapped eyes on. Like most British films in this new age, I found it to be typically crass. Oh and as for Jason Statham

[stern_howie]

I saw this last week, I enjoyed it but quite forgettable

[stoner]

I really enjoyed this film.

[JMS]

Very enjoyable film, if you have not had chance to see it, i would recommend.

[DB7]

I saw this last week, I enjoyed it but quite forgettable

Extremely, I'm not really sure the treatment was worthy of a feature as it was little better than the Brinks Mat tv-film.

[The_Gronk]

I just watched that because my online rental service sent it to me.



I was really surprised. I thought Jason Stratham would be doing his Transporter-act, only in London. Luckily, he played a rogue with a bit more depth.



I'd be interested to know how much of it really was "based on a true story"

[pelam123]

That phrase is such a misnomer, it gives writers carte blanche to dramatise. Look at "In The Name Of The Father" based on a true story maybe, but full of factual inaccuracies and inventions portrayed as fact.



As for The Bank Job, I believe the part about the existence of the Princess Margaret photos was true....as she certainly erm, put it about a bit, shall we say.

[mrs_emma_peel]

The Bank Job (2008) (Terrestrial Televison Premiere)
Channel 4 … Sunday 1st May 2011 … 9.00-11.10pm

You’re in safe hands in this period, highly entertaining British crime movie, written by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais (The Likely Lads, Porridge, Auf Wiedersehen, Pet) and directed by Roger Donaldson (Thirteen Days, The World’s Fastest Indian).

Based on an incredible true story … The 1971 Baker Street Robbery (sounds exactly like a Sherlock Holmes story) in which a gang really did tunnel underground from a rented shop into a Lloyds Bank … the film’s producer’s claim that the story was covered up by MI5 at the time owing to photographs of a certain Royal Princess …



Photographs revealing certain a Royal Princess in extremely compromising positions … and a crime that could expose the Monarchy … a crime that could uncover the ultimate scandal … Erotic, sexually explicit photographs of Princess Margaret … in one of the bank’s safe deposit boxes.

These scandalous revelations could be new explosive evidence … The Bank Job has a likeable cast that includes Jason Statham, Saffron Burrows and Peter Bowles, and as a powerful Soho pornographer, Poirot himself, David Suchet.

Scripted with a light touch by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais and directed with considerable verve by Roger Donaldson, The Bank Job is a combination of heist movie and conspiracy thriller. It's a speculative account of what lay behind the actual robbery in 1971 of a branch of Lloyds Bank in London's Baker Street. Amazingly, a radio ham recorded the thieves' walkie-talkie conversation while they worked and alerted the cops, but no one was brought to justice.

This was just a year before Watergate and the film's producers claim that whereas the Washington break-in opened the greatest can of worms of the 20th century, the scandal the London robbery would have revealed was squashed by the government issuing a D notice in the interests of national security.

A case of life imitating art, the robbers borrowed their plan from Baker Street's most famous resident; Sherlock Holmes's tale 'The Red-Headed League' details how thieves tunnel into a bank vault from a shop down the street. The sympathetic minor villains, led by Jason Statham, have been conned into this caper by a beautiful model with underworld connections (Saffron Burrows), who's being blackmailed by the security-service people.

She's after a safety-deposit box containing compromising photographs of a British Princess having sex with a couple of black studs in the Caribbean. The pictures are being used by evil Black Power charlatan Michael X, respected friend of John Lennon and Yoko One, seen here dining with him, for blackmail purposes to keep the law at bay. But after a successful heist, the crooks discover that in addition to money and jewellery, they also have the account book of a Soho pornographer and vice-king (David Suchet) recording his bribes to the cops and compromising photographs of toffs, civil servants and politicians from the deposit box of a fashionable brothel-owner.

So the hapless crooks are pursued by MI5, the Special Branch, ruthless gangsters, bent bogeys, a single honest cop (the one good apple in the Met's barrel) and the Royal Family in the form of a benign Mountbatten.

The film races along with the speed of a bullet train, catches the 1960s ethos and is a great deal of powerful subversive fun. The story is rich with corruption and period early 1970’s detail, the pop songs are well chosen, and the action, though violent, is well handled. (US/UK/Aus)
Contains violence, swearing, nudity and, surprisingly, edited for some sex-scenes … although, as the film is being premiered on Channel Four this may well be an error.

Jason Statham, Saffron Burrows, Stephen Campbell Moore, Daniel Mays, James Faulkner,
Alki David, Peter Bowles, David Suchet.
Director: Roger Donaldson

Sources: Radio Times/DigiGuide/The Guardian/Philip French … The Observer/YouTube
Mrs Emma Peel