Das große Dings bei Brinks

In 1938 Boston, petty criminal Tony Pino (Peter Falk) and his robbery gang get caught. In 1944, his friend Joe McGinnis (Peter Boyle) picks him up after getting released from prison. He rejoins wife Mary (Gena Rowlands). He gets a new crew which includes idiot brother-in-law Vinnie (Allen Garfield), disturbed war veteran Specs O'Keefe (Warren Oates), and Jazz Maffie (Paul Sorvino). The bumbling crew struggles to rob a candy factory. Tony passes by Brink's and is enticed by the cash. He talks into the warehouse and copies a key. The crew starts stealing from the trucks but no one seems to catch on. They realize the careless security and robs the vault for $1 million. The large amount and notoriety draws in J. Edgar Hoover (Sheldon Leonard).

It's a fine period heist movie from William Friedkin. There's a bit of fun. This is not a high functioning crew. It could easily turn into a more slapstick comedy than it already is. There are some great idiocy like Specs suggesting blasting the vault with a bazooka. There are bits and pieces of goodness but I'm less enamored with the last section. It becomes a muddle as the crew is gathered up. The action is lost and I can't figure out each character. Normally, the action would go bigger into the climax. I do have respect for going the other way including Mary casually making dinner for the cops.

Dino DeLaurentis' "The Brinks Job" actually holds an infamous place in Boston's cinematic history. In an attempt to distance itself from a cheap TV movie quickie (made to capitalize on the announcement of the big-budget film) director William Friedkin decided to shoot his version in Boston at the actual site of the crime -- the Brink's building -- long since converted into a neighborhood parking garage and available to rent out.

There had been a few movies shooting mostly exteriors in Boston in the 70s including the still locally remembered "The Friends of Eddie Coyle" in 1973. But "Brinks" was the largest production ever mounted with Friedkin completely shooting it in the Boston area. And because of what happened during the production, Hollywood avoided shooting anything of this size in Boston for 20 years!

When the movie trucks rolled in, the privateers descended. Suddenly, anything the movie company needed to buy was more expensive and the crew had to conceal who they were when purchasing goods and services. But the worst was what the Teamsters did.

The production wanted the key people of the film to be picked up by limos in the morning and brought back to their hotels in the evening. But the local Teamsters insisted that their drivers be paid to be standing by 24-hours a day, seven days a week which added $1 million to the film's budget. Two Teamster leaders were found guilty of racketeering and mail fraud and sentenced to jail time because of this shake-down. It was learned the Teamsters had been doing this to films shot in Boston for the previous 10 years.

Additionally, the film's Boston production office was held up by armed gunmen who made off with 15 reels of film which were held for $600,000 in ransom. The thieves later lowered their demand to $500,000, but were told over the phone by Friedkin that the footage was duplicates and they could keep them.

Word filtered back to Hollywood to avoid Boston and for nearly 20 years major productions skipped the city and used other places like Philadelphia to stand in for Boston. "A Civil Action" in 1997 represented a turning point and since then the city and the state of Massachusetts cleaned up their act and even sought out film productions by offering an unlimited 25% tax incentive.

Today, Boston and Massachusetts are bustling with more than 30 productions a year with three sound stage facilities and more planned for the area. But in the '80s and most of the '90s, the city was a no-man's land for movies as it paid the price for profiteering off "The Brinks Job."

Compared to the hyped up, over violent fare that passes for crime movies, this movie is no contender. But it's a warm, funny, well paced caper flick about some North Boston Italians who stumbled on to the fact that the great Brink's was a paper tiger.

I remember when this movie was filmed back in 78. yeah its dating myself. The movie was filmed at MCI ( Massachusetts Correctional Facility) Concord, Concord Mass. My father while actually working there was an extra. I had a chance to meet Mr.Falk and a few others as a kid ( I was ten). We had free tickets to the opening. I thought it was an awesome movie about bungling thieves. Most folks expected a serious thief/heist movie. Although based on an actual event. I found the movie comical. Although it didn't have Mini coopers jumping through a European city. It did serve its purpose as a good funny movie. A good buy as a bargain.

What's impressive about "The Brink's Job" is that it's a true story that also manages to be a lighthearted comedy. I had never heard of the Great Brink's Robbery until watching this movie, but William Friedkin managed to turn it into a fun story. Peter Falk, Peter Boyle, Warren Oates, Gena Rowlands, Paul Sorvino, Sheldon Leonard* and the rest of the cast turn in fine performances. It was a pleasant surprise to see Malachy McCourt (the brother of "Angela's Ashes" author Frank McCourt) in a supporting role. It so happened that I had watched this just a few hours after watching the horror-fantasy flick "Q", which also featured him in a supporting role. It was a pure coincidence that I rented two movies that happened to star him.

All in all, a good movie. I suspect that they had fun filming it. Really different turn for Friedkin after "The French Connection" and "The Exorcist".

*Put another way, the movie stars Columbo, Frankenstein's monster, one of the Wild Bunch, the woman under the influence, Henry Kissinger and the producer of several TV shows (and namesake of the main characters on "The Big Bang Theory").