The Italian Jobs

On Saturday’s foray into town, I went to see The Italian Job – which is not a bad movie in and of itself, albeit not a great one either. The problems with it lie in the fact that it’s a remake of The Italian Job, which is a superior film in practically every way. The new version does at least come with an (almost) entirely new plot, which does give it some interest for aficionados of the original, but on the downside:

• The Cast: Mos Def and Seth Green are pretty good in the remake, but the original had Michael Caine, Noël Coward and even Benny Hill.
• The Chase: Yes there are red, white and blue Minis and the traffic jam, but the chase sequence in the new version is much curtailed and a pitiful shadow of that in the original. Helicopter niftiness adds something, but not much.
• The Music: The original had cracking tunes and rousing songs. The new version has … um … er … well, clearly nothing memorable.
• The Ending: The original has what is indisputably one of the greatest movie endings of all time, and nicely handles the fact that the protagonists aren’t exactly ’good guys’. The remake, however, has the predictable Hollywood schmaltz – the protagonists get their happily-ever-afters and the antagonist gets his comeuppance. Yawn.
• The Missing Line: You’re only supposed to blow the bloody doors off! – I rest my case.