Den Of Thieves review: Gerard Butler leads the cast of this gritty cops and robbers thriller from debut director Christian Gudegast.
Den Of Thieves review by Paul Heath, January 2018.
Den Of Thieves review
Over the past few years, I’ve unknowingly found myself becoming more and more a fan of Gerard Butler. His last couple of movies, action sequel London Has Fallen and last year’s climate-focused big-budget disaster movie Geostorm, which were widely ill-received by virtually every other critic, somehow managed to somehow hit the bulls-eye for me, both for very similar reasons. Those two films didn’t take themselves too seriously, were tons of fun to watch, and I left the auditorium with a huge smile on my face both times. Butler’s latest, a cat and mouse cop film which seemed to have ‘generic action thriller’ stamped all over it looking at some of the early marketing material, actually ventures into a more serious territory, a film that has more in common with the films of Michael Mann than Michael Bay.
Related: Geostorm review
Butler plays the lead role of [Big] Nick O’Brien, leader of The Regulators, a team of crack law enforcement troops working for the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department. We meet them as they hone in on newly released Ray Merrimen (Pablo Schreiber) and his elite gang of bad-ass bank robbers who are plotting an almighty heist to set them on their way into retirement. However, as Nick and his colleagues soon find out, they may face more than they bargained for as the target of Merrimen and his crew is none other than the city’s Federal Reserve Bank, a seemingly impossible place to turn over.
Den Of Thieves review
If you think of Den Of Thieves as a sweary, violent contemporary action-thriller crossing Heat with a sprinkling of Ocean’s Eleven, you may be halfway there. While definitely not matching either of those films in terms of quality or gravitas, Den Of Thieves is actually a very entertaining, engrossing watch from start to finish.
While too long – the opus clocks in at a butt-numbing 140 minutes – there’s tons on offer to keep fans of the genre happy. First up is the beefed-up Butler, the actor clearly relishing a meatier role than the more laughable characters he’s portrayed in the throw-away popcorn movies of recent times. He’s supported by quite the cast. We have the very talented Pablo Schrieber as the other lead alpha male – the antagonist of the piece if you will – the villainous Merriman who is every bit as watchable and who has just as much screen presence as the season Scottish actor. Surpassing both of them in terms of walkability though is the relative newcomer O’Shea Jackson Jr. – so good in N.W.A. biopic Straight Outta Compton – who really knocks it out of the park here.
Debuting director Christian Gudegast, writer of Butler’s London Has Fallen, helms with an unrelenting intensity from the off, his screenplay also sending swerve-balls throughout while taking us on a journey that really ignites the screen in virtually every frame. While there are elements of the script that feel fatty – notably the backstories of the main characters that it insists on delving into – you can’t help but nod along with the perfect action beats that are sprinkled throughout the narrative.
When you add in a plot twist that I really didn’t see coming in the closing scenes, you have a pretty solid, gritty crime drama that, although sometimes touched with unneeded schmaltz and frequent cliche, manages to deliver on its promise.
Den Of Thieves review by Paul Heath, January 2018
Den Of Thieves is released in UK cinemas on Friday 2nd February 2018.
