Una bionda tutta d'oro

As a heist movie, I didn't enjoy much. As an action, I have seen better and more memorable. As for the acting, no one did her or his best here. So what's this movie's really interesting point? I'll tell you. It's the title's role.

Movies have accustomed us to watch that kind of roles played by men, not women. That confident, genius, and heartwarming thief has been always a man. This time, it's (Kim Basinger).

Since the 1970s, the American cinema had gone a long way to assure that women can be heroes too. Look closer to 1993 movies: there was violent yet sensitive woman (Point of No Return), a remake of the French movie (La Femme Nikita - 1990), who is a dusty female copy of (James Bond). Funny and philanthropic woman (Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit), a comic copy of (To Sir With Love - 1967). And there was (Body Snatchers) too, a remake of (Invasion of the Body Snatchers - 1959), where the lead role was given to a girl, played by (Gabrielle Anwar). Clearly, it was a man's world, but not anymore.

In another, less daring, less creative, treatment, this could have been a movie for say (Val Kilmer), however - for this movie's good and ours - THANK GOD it wasn't!

So, it's low-tone average entertainment for some afternoon, where its Real McCoy factor is in the sex of who played its Real McCoy!

As a director of music video clips, Russell Mulcahy is something of a living legend. Aside from directing the first video MTV ever aired (back when they did that sort of thing), he also helmed the clips for acts like The Rolling Stones, Elton John, Queen, Billy Joel, and a myriad of other artists. It may take a handful of film class periods to wholly examine his prolific work in the eighties.

As a film director, however, his work is much more difficult to digest. "Ricochet" and "Resident Evil: Extinction" are able actioners, but his only real classic is "Highlander". Needless to say, it's classic of the most cultish variety, which was probably inevitable considering lead Christopher Lambert is as wooden an actor as a totem pole. I won't even get into wild misfires like "The Shadow" or low budget television tripe like "The Curse of King Tut's Tomb". It's a tall order to get excited about a director that foists that sort of work on an unsuspecting public.

It was quite a surprise, then, to find that "The Real McCoy" stands among some of Mulcahy's best film work. The plotting follows a rather formulaic heist tale, which also requires serious suspension of disbelief on the part of the audience as we're supposed to believe Kim Basinger is some sort of master thief. Val Kilmer portrays an amiable yet inept robber while the great Terence Stamp is sadly wasted as the local crime boss. He's essentially playing the same role Ben Gazzara did in Road House, except Englishman Stamp was forced to adopt a horrific Southern American accent for his role.

Despite a predictable plot and somewhat dubious casting, "The Real McCoy" is an entirely enjoyable heist film in the same vein as The Score. Granted, neither are particularly memorable, yet they make for ample entertainment on a rainy afternoon. Highlights include Kilmer's singularly hilarious botched convenience store robbery and the intricate, if entirely implausible, bank heist at the climax of the film.

In summation, if you're able to believe Basinger as a world-class thief who handles with equal aplomb both air compressed second-story apparati and complex computer wizardry, you may enjoy this film. If you can accept that Terence Stamp is attempting to effect some kind of Southern American accent and has absolutely no room within the script to even pretend to act, you may enjoy this film. If you can stomach a vastly dated, ear-grating score that was composed almost entirely on a mid- eighties era synthesizer, you will almost certainly enjoy this film.

The Real McCoy has one of the most impossible storylines around. But how can you not love a movie which contains the line, "What's not normal about getting on a plane with your mom and going down to Rio with 3 million dollars?" Some parts, especially the set-up, are slow, but on the whole it's a great, implausible romp. It's also a must for Kilmer and Basinger fans.

From what I've seen (for the most part), if there's a Trans Am in a movie, then the movie's going to be good. "The Driver", "Smokey and the Bandit", "Donnie Darko", "Blue Thunder", all awesome, and each one proudly displaying a Firebird. Pretty good rule of thumb, thus far.

Not so with the "The Real McCoy", which is mostly a brain-dead affair - in the sense that you can be half-comatose on the couch and still follow the plot. This thing's so formulaic, it doesn't take any brain power to keep up. It's just one heist movie cliché after another. They even manage to waste Terrence Stamp on a vanilla bad guy role (dammit, that should be a federal crime!). It's a little shocking just how meek Kim Basinger comes off here, what with her being the numero-uno cat burglar. Who knows, maybe Catwoman ruined me, but they could've hardened this character.

5/10

Not sure why this film gets trashed as much as it does, since it's pretty good. It's worth watching for the cast alone -- Basinger, Kilmer and Stamp. But it must be said that the British film upon which it's based is better. That would be Bellman and True (from an old English song) starring a cast of people that you probably never heard of, headlined by Bernard Hill as the computer geek who has to go along to keep his son safe. Bellman and True also serves as something of a time capsule, taking us back to a grotty, depressed and depressing London that is barely visible in British films any more. We can probably put the change in tone down to the Four Weddings effect. The comparison of these two movies serves as an excellent example of one of the more interesting questions of popular culture: why are the Brits generally so much better at movies that feature crime than Hollywood? Think of Cracker, State of Play, Prime Suspect, Behind The Lines, and Mobile.