Christopher Walken, Morgan Freeman and William H. Macy in a heist flick? Sign me up!
It sounds like one of the sure-fire hits of any given year. So how did this film slip quietly onto DVD shelves without so much as a whimper? Admittedly, it is not the great film it promises to be… But it doesn’t deserve to be ignored.
To call it a heist flick is to do a disservice to heist flicks. It has no basis in any kind of believable reality whatsoever. Instead, “The Maiden Heist” is a goofy comedy that features an art theft as its central plot point. Walken, Freeman and Macy play three long-time museum security guards who are each very attached to a piece in the gallery. When they hear that the exhibition is moving to Denmark, they hatch a scheme to steal the three works of art and replace them with replicas.
Now, I am not going to claim that this is their best work. The three legendary actors will not be listing this effort at the top of their résumés. However, I enjoyed the silly ride. I liked the quirky characters. I loved the interactions between them. Sure, it feels a lot like TV sit-com humor — cheap and cheerful. What’s so wrong with that?
It won’t make it into DVD collections, but I think most people will get a kick out of it.
