Thomas Crown ist nicht zu fassen

The original "Thomas Crown Affair" directed by Norman Jewison is one of the coolest movies ever made and great fun for all of its 100 minutes - a clever bank-heist caper combined with the sensual romance where both participants (the brilliant bank robber and his match, the sultry and shrewd insurance investigator) are sophisticated, quick-witted and oh so cool. The split-screen technique really works well in this movie and I should mention the song "The Windmills of Your Mind" by Michel Legrand that very deservingly received an Oscar - and it does not happen often in the best song categories.

The chess game between "King Of Cool" Steve McQueen and 27 year old Faye Dunaway in the most provocative dress possible is one of the sexiest and most exiting without actual sex involved (my favorite kind of scenes - let my imagination work, let everything happen in my mind) scenes ever filmed. IMO, the 60s was one of the best dressed decades ever with the first wave of mini (and I mean it) skirts and elegant suits and dresses.

From Faye Dunaway's interview to "USA Today" about working with McQueen, "We had the most magical spark. Our hearts and souls combined. There was no romance off screen but on screen it was like a smack."

Having just revisited this one for what seems like 10 years (oh wait, it is about ten years), the first thing that chips away at me is the overkilling of gimmicks and a need to be art for arts sake. It's such a shame because the sexual tension of the two leads coupled with a deft story should have made for a 60s masterpiece, but sadly I think Norman Jewison (Director) must have gotten carried away like a kid in a sweet shop with the tools available to him in that burgeoning part of the decade.

The use of split screens works at the start but come the end of the film one feels like they have been hit over the head with it to the point of nausea. It also takes a third of the film before Faye Dunaway's Vicky Anderson shows up, which is fine if the film was actually another 30 minutes longer, yet the film isn't any longer and so we get a forced hour of blossoming love and passion and it leaves little room for fleshing out of the characters in relation to the crime heartbeat of the film.

There is still much to enjoy here, tho, the story is very impressive and it's one that intrigues all the way to the splendid finale. McQueen & Dunaway sizzle on the screen, none more so than during a chess sequence that had me hot under the collar. Some memorable scenes such as our couple in a sand buggy disturbing flocks of birds, and the scenes in Boston are just delightful, but ultimately the film goes down as style over substance exercise, a big chance wasted, which to a McQueen fan such as myself is infuriating in the extreme. 6.5/10

Not what I expected. I expected a movie centered around Steve McQueen pulling off a heist. But actually it's a movie where the (brief) heist occurs early and the rest of the movie is about an insurance investigator played by Faye Dunaway trying to snare McQueen. The leaps of logic that allow Dunaway to get on McQueen's trail strain credulity even more than the implausible heist. The plot leaks like a sieve but the flashy direction and charismatic performances by the leads keeps you interested. McQueen and Dunaway definitely had chemistry. Hard to believe that terrible theme song won an Oscar. It's a good film so give it a shot, especially if you're a fan of "the king of cool" Steve McQueen.

Thomas Crown is a mysterious gazillionaire who is frankly bored with his life. What to do when you're a thirty something and have all the resources available. For a lark, plan the perfect crime.

So in The Thomas Crown Affair, Steve McQueen does just that. He recruits four people at random for the crime, none of whom know each other and pull off a really neat bank robbery.

It seems like Paul Burke and the Boston PD aren't getting the job done so the bank brings in Faye Dunaway as an insurance investigator. She does this for a 10% finders fee, not for a policeman's salary. She also doesn't have to follow the rules the way the cops do.

Dunaway is smart and she does figure out it's McQueen who's the mastermind. She baits him in some of the same way that Inspector Slimane baits Pepe LeMoko. Of course she really gets up close and personal in a way that Slimane couldn't. All this really does get to Paul Burke, whose performance is unfortunately overlooked in talking about The Thomas Crown Affair.

It's a battle of hubris between McQueen and Dunaway and the film does keep you in some suspense as to who will win out.

The Thomas Crown Affair garnered won Academy Award for Michel LeGrand's song, The Windmills of Your Mind. It's a stylishly done caper film and I guarantee you won't be able to anticipate the outcome.

Thomas Crown is a Boston financier who organises a daring bank robbery. This crime is not committed because he needs the money- he has made a large fortune from entirely lawful activities- but because he is bored with life and needs excitement. The police are in the dark as to who might have been responsible, but the bank's insurers are determined to recover their money and appoint Vicki Anderson, a tough female investigator, to look into the affair. Vicki soon comes to suspect Crown, but cannot prove his involvement, and so a game of cat and mouse begins between them. Vicki makes contact with Crown, hoping that he will give himself away, but he is well aware of her suspicions and is too clever to betray himself. They find themselves attracted to one another and eventually begin a love affair, leaving Vicki torn between her feelings for Crown and the job she has been assigned to do (in which she also has a financial interest, as she has been promised a percentage of any money she recovers).

The above scenario is, of course, implausible, but this is not a realistic film. It is a glossy colour supplement of a film that one watches not for realism or for its plot but for an atmosphere that has been described as the epitome of sixties cool. The trappings of Crown's millionaire lifestyle are much on display- his expensive cars, his luxuriously furnished penthouse apartment, his Cape Cod beach-house, his private glider, his games of golf and polo. (His surname is significantly derived from a symbol of wealth and power). The two leading actors, both iconic figures of the sixties, are perfectly cast. Steve McQueen was known not only as the Cooler King (his role in "The Great Escape") but also as the King of Cool. He was normally cast in "tough guy" roles, but here he broadens his range by taking on the role of a suave, wealthy playboy (although still with a hint of toughness), the sort of man every man wants to be and every woman wants for herself. Faye Dunaway was perhaps not a classical beauty in the style of some other sixties icons such as Raquel Welch or Julie Christie, but few actresses were better than she at conveying elegant, sophisticated glamour.

Everyone who sees this film seems to remember it for the same three things. First, there is director Norman Jewison's use of the "split screen" technique during the robbery and in the scenes of the polo match. This has been criticised as a gimmick, but I found that it did help to give these sequences a greater sense of urgency and rapid movement, a sense also heightened by Michel Legrand's driving musical score. (Legrand also provided a similar score for the British film "The Go-Between"). Second, there is the famous scene, full of sexual symbolism and suggestion but without any overt sexual content, where Vicki seduces Crown- or perhaps it would be more accurate to say they seduce one another- over a game of chess. (Faye Dunaway was at her best here). Third is the well-known theme song "The Windmills of Your Mind". The song's rather enigmatic lyrics do not have any direct reference to the plot of the film, but it fits the general mood perfectly, particularly as the plot itself is often enigmatic.

The sixties were the golden age of the heist movie with films such as "Topkapi", "The Biggest Bundle of them All" and "The Italian Job", all of which featured daring robberies carried out by a glamorous cast, often in an exotic setting. This genre has been criticised- and there is justice in the criticism- for glamorising crime and dishonesty, and "The Thomas Crown Affair", although it concentrates as much on the aftermath of the crime as on the robbery itself, falls within this tradition and must therefore bear some of the criticism. It is, however, unlikely that it ever persuaded anyone to take up a career as a millionaire playboy criminal mastermind. It is too obviously a fantasy for that- with its visual tricks, its highly stylised acting (especially from Miss Dunaway) and a general atmosphere that seems unreal, at times even dreamlike, it has about as much to do with real crime as the James Bond films have to do with the everyday work of the British Secret Service. Moreover, unlike some of the other heist movies, such as "The Italian Job" or "The Biggest Bundle", which have artificially moralistic endings, "The Thomas Crown Affair" at least has the courage of its own amorality. Its ending may be ambiguous, but it does not try to drive home a "crime does not pay" message.

I prefer this film to the recent Pierce Brosnan remake which, although it has its good points, lacks the distinctive style of the original film. The original has, in fact, been criticised for being a triumph of style over substance. Well yes, it is- but with style like this, who's complaining? 7/10