or, “Putting Ray-Bans on a Turd
and Calling it Potato Head”:
A spoiler-free mini movie review.
1.5 out of 5
“Crime 101” eluded first impressions, due to my needing a movie for Papa that wasn’t animated, subtitled, or sexy. Otherwise, its poster – with the cast’s faces on it, like a direct-to-video DVD cover from the late 2000s – should’ve been a sign.
Then, I was marked by its totally agreeable first hour: propulsive, and well acted & shot. Despite narrative formulaicity, there was novelty in some tightly-directed transitions of one character walking by another before they’d met in the story – like the ensemble drama “Magnolia”. I trusted the film was going somewhere.
But then I took inventory: maybe it was that the characters didn’t develop beyond their scripted function; maybe it was the forced romantic subplot; or maybe it was its dreary “Inside Man” style denouement.
Regardless, my film school side took over and I couldn’t bear it anymore. “Crime 101” is here for the long con.
[cont’d]
*
Audiences in their twenties may not have patience for older properties, but why reference anything else when Michael Mann’s “Heat” is such a good example of a ‘heist movie’? “Heat” has enough working ingredients that most can overlook its pronounced flaws: the love scenes kill the pacing; and there isn’t enough action outside its venerated bank heist sequence.
As a “Heat” contemporary (even ‘appropriating’ one of Diane Venora’s monologues), “Crime 101” is hopelessly complacent towards trying anything new, while simultaneously offering itself every opportunity to do so.
Why is Chris Hemsworth’s character nervous around prostitutes? Who was Barry Keoghan’s father, and was that why Nick Nolte didn’t scold him for being psychotic? Why didn’t Halle Berry rip off the paintings instead? What was Mark Ruffalo’s inciting trauma?
*
Another element embezzled from “Heat” is underutilizing name faces for awkward cameos: beloved eccentric Jennifer Jason Leigh appears for thirty seconds, while “24: Legacy’s” Corey Hawkins should’ve been promoted from Ruffalo’s partner, to solo lead.
Viewers are empathetic toward “Heat’s” characters because we followed them while they lived to work. If we didn’t see that minutiae, their single-mindedness would make them boring. By neglecting to paint those procedural details, writer/director Bart Layton’s canvas relegates his one-note deadbeats to their tediously bland broad stokes.
*
If you want to remake “Heat”, it’s not rocket science: tone down the romantic drama, and add more action. “Crime 101” does neither, while mistaking pathos for depth and wasting a stacked cast. It’s criminal.
//wd 2.21.2026
Poster sourced from impawards.com. Screenshot from Amazon/MGM.
theory of a daskeman 