Tower Heist (2 Stars)

So as you might have guessed, there’s a tower. It’s a very, very, very tall ritzy tower where snobby rich people live. Then there’s a heist. It’s a somewhat, moderately interesting heist with a well-known cast of actors. Sometimes there are funny moments. Most of the time, there are not. The story is simple. Rich guy invested the towers’ employees’ pension funds and now he is being put on trial for fraud and all that good stuff. Ben Stiller’s character won’t stand for this and he gathers other disgruntled employees together in hopes of successfully hatching a scheme to steal money from rich old guy. It is believed that rich old guy has a safe hidden in one of the walls of his penthouse apartment. What a total rich old guy thing to do! Clearly, the only logical thing to do is get to that safe.

The story moves forward at a steady pace and Eddie Murphy is a welcome wild card to the cast. It’s nice to see him in a movie that is actually watchable. He curses too! The downfall, as is with most elaborate heist movies with a large cast, is that the viewer never gets the opportunity to get to know all the characters. As a result, I was wasn't ever fully invested in them.

To add to the faults of the film, the heist never feels that risky. Rich old guy’s court date is moved to Thanksgiving Day, which happens to be during the big gigantic enormous parade. Coincidence or part of the plan? With rich old guy out of the apartment, this opens a window for the dysfunctional crew of thieves. The film does its best to add intrigue with a couple of plot twists involving a certain greedy individual on the team trying to get the money for himself. Ultimately, the comedic moments are more interesting than funny and the heist lacks excitement.

Spoiler Alert! I mean it! I will ruin the movie for you if you continue reading!

I thought it was clever that the safe in the wall was empty and that all the money was the solid gold car that was in old rich guy’s apartment (chip some paint off and you’ll see all the gooooooold). It was also fun that the car was dangling out of the building as the band of misfits attempted to move the car down to a lower level apartment. That being said, there was a huge missed opportunity here. How do you have the prize of the heisters (hmm… I like that non-word) be a car and not have an elaborate car chase as grand finale?! Think about it. The money is the car. What if the car is destroyed in the chase? The intensity level would easily jump from a four to at least a nine. Maybe even a ten.

The Breakdown: A mediocre heist comedy. I would have liked Eddie Murphy to have gotten more screen time and a showier finale for the film. I suppose you can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you just might find that you get what you need. I needed to see a light movie and that’s what I got. It was entertaining enough. Watch Tower Heist and enjoy it for its little moments. Just don’t expect a great flick overall.