“Tower Heist” is being lauded as a throwback to the hilarious action comedies that first started Eddie Murphy’s career, such “Beverly Hills Cop” and “48 Hours.” I, for one, have to agree.
I must admit, I came into the film with doubts. It seemed like it would be a cheap remake of “Ocean’s Eleven” set in New York. But I was delighted to be proven wrong. “Tower Heist” is a film to go see with your friends, your significant other or even your parents. It’s a comedy caper with witty dialogue, a stellar cast and laughter all around.
Josh Kovacs (Ben Stiller) works as the manager of a Manhattan high-rise apartment building called The Tower, where apartments start at $5.6 million. A regular guy from Queens, he manages a staff of working-class people like his brother-in-law Charlie (Casey Affleck), Jamaican maid Odessa (Gabourey Sidibe) and new elevator operator Enrique (Michael Pena).@@http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0471042/@@
Wall Street kingpin Arthur Shaw (Alan Alda)@@same link@@ lives in the penthouse of” The Tower,” complete with rooftop pool. Instead of the nice, smiling rich man he appears to be, Shaw turns out to be a Bernie Madoff-type who has “invested” the pensions of The Tower staff and lost it all in a pyramid scheme. After reaching bail, Shaw is kept under house arrest in his penthouse, guarded by an FBI team under the direction of Special Agent Claire Denham (Tea Leoni)
At first Kovacs doubts Shaw’s guilt, but after The Tower’s doorman Lester (Stephen Henderson) tells Kovacs he lost his entire life savings with Shaw, Kovacs smells the fishiness of the situation@@that’s what he said@@. Suspecting Shaw has a pile of cash in the penthouse, Kovacs ultimately decides to get back the money Shaw stole and give it to the staff, Robin Hood-style, to which Charlie raises the objection: “Josh, we’re not criminals. We don’t know how to steal!”
Kovacs replies, “I know someone who does.”
Enter Slide (Eddie Murphy), a part-time criminal who lives on the same low-income street in Queens as Kovacs. Soon the two join forces with an unemployed Wall Street guru and an evicted tenant of The Tower, Mr. Fitzhugh (Matthew Broderick), to invade Shaw’s apartment and find the money they deserve.
The situations in the film are at times hilariously absurd, and it’s a bit of a stretch to imagine real people acting in similar circumstances — robbing a highly secured penthouse with the FBI involved? Somehow the film makes it work. The writing is a key aspect. The movie has about 45 minutes of set up before the heist storyline even starts. Establishing characters and grounding the audience in the story makes viewers care about and root for the workers of The Tower. You love Charlie’s nervousness about his soon-to-be-born baby, you love Enrique’s wide-eyed stupidity and incompetence and you love Lester’s dreams of retiring on a sunny beach somewhere.
The film also succeeds in making the audience laugh out loud. The writing is sometimes sidesplitting, especially with Murphy, who plays up the wiseass@@wiseass is actually in the dictionary as one word@@ and rude confrontation to hilarity. Other times the funny, snort-inducing moments are the off-topic asides mumbled by characters or throw-away lines in the middle of scenes.
Shaw is a villain you love to hate. He seems unassuming as he’s old and white, and he plays chess. In fact, the chess metaphor comes up a lot, so much of the action in the film could be seen as a giant chess game between Shaw and Kovacs. Shaw is confident he’ll win, so it’s all the more satisfying to see Kovacs and his mismatched team of bumbling thieves try to take him down a notch.
Sure it’s not all believable, but it’s a fantasy of Occupy Wall Street’s 99 percent: getting the money back from the Wall Street tycoons who have stolen it. And the end makes Kovacs’ comeuppance a little more believable and not entirely the easy, happily-ever-after ending it could be.
Grade: B+