The Italian Job
Directed by F. Gary Gray
Starring Mark Wahlberg, Charlize Theron, Donald Sutherland, Edward Norton and Mos Def
Rated PG-13 for violence and some language.

You’re not really supposed to talk about race. People get upset, they say it’s not relevant, that people are people etc. But of course when you look at Hollywood it becomes painfully obvious that race is one of the movie industry’s top concerns. For the most part it’s about business. Knowing how to sell to various demographics is probably Hollywood’s number one strength lately, especially with its consumption of the ‘indie’ industry allowing it to decide which small budget pictures fill necessary demand niches and which don’t. And one of Hollywood’s number one demographic rules has always been that you use black directors almost exclusively in order to sell films to black audiences. This, of course, isn’t an unbroken commandment, but when you look at the filmographies of directors like John Singleton, F. Gary Gray, Antoine Fuqua, Spike and Malcolm Lee you’ll see a list of films almost all directed at a black viewership.

But the trend seems to be one of improvement. Spike Lee has taken a big step by starting up his own production company and making whatever films he wants. Fuqua’s Tears of the Sun didn’t fare all that well but it did feature a black director paired with a white star, Bruce Willis. And Gray’s (Friday, The Negotiator) The Italian Job continues this trend as the film features a predominantly white cast and is being marketed towards a general (i.e. mostly white) audience. These are small steps, but they’re in the right direction.

Additionally, this past week both The Italian Job and Singleton’s 2 Fast 2 Furious were in the box office top five, for whatever that’s worth.

Unfortunately, the actual film in question isn’t all that interesting. A remake of an unremarkable film from the 60s, The Italian Job is a brisk, fairly enjoyable watch, but also a film almost entirely devoid of substance. The movie begins with an interesting and tightly edited credit sequence that’s followed by a heist-and-chase scene on the canals of Venice. It’s a nice start, and it represents all that is both good and bad about the film. For one, it’s undeniably stylish and slick. The cinematography is nice and the movie flows along smoothly. On the other hand, the scene is under explained and awkwardly acted
There’s some good action and you can have a good time watching, so long as you don’t take too long to think about it.

In the end that’s pretty much what you have. A movie that isn’t emotionally involving but can provide an hour and fortie minutes of amusement if you watch it from a distance. This effect is achieved mostly by the story’s structure. While theoretically a heist film, it doesn’t really take you into the heads of the thieves as most film’s of the genre will attempt to. You’re not given the nitty gritty details of the plan and whether or not it’s intentional, there’s little temptation to figure out exactly what’s going on. The character’s are given motivations, but they’re simple and mostly uninteresting, further keeping you out of their heads. The film’s script is essentially a series chase scenes hung on the skeleton of a heist film, with an emotional motivation or two to help make the narrative work. But there’s really no identification. You root for Wahlberg’s good guy and against Norton’s bad guy, but their characters are so paper thin it’s impossible to truly care. It’s a stylish, fast film, that I found quite watchable, but little more.

As a quick final note, Edward Norton has never been so misused. He plays the prototypical bad-bad guy. The sort of role you’d expect to see James Woods or James Caan in maybe. It’s a badly written part and he brings nothing to it. Apparently he only did it because he signed a contract and couldn’t get out. It shows. He’s a great actor but he gives his worst performance. A complete waste.

Rating 56%