The Big Steal

This is the sort of film, the Australian film industry needs to make more of. No forced acting.

Do your self a favor and hire it on video its just a great movie and very funny also any bens films are worth a see ive seen em all

It doesn't matter if you like teen movies or not , once you have seen the Aussie version of this genre you will forget all the rest. Ben Mendelson and Claudia Carvan make you fall into the plot as a teen couple from different sides of the school yard who eventually fall in love. However , as with all teenage boys , Danny Clarke (Mendelson) cant resist the fallacy of having to find a way to impress the girl and win her love, and you guessed it , it involves a CAR ! A jaguar no less ! Anyway , with the help of his friends they get the car of his dream only to realize that they have been ripped off by the car yard he bought it from. Needless to say, the girl is not impressed by cars, and the resulting chaos of getting back at the car dealer ends up in a hilarious comedy of everyone chasing each other around. I still remember this film as the one that made me fall head over heels in love with Claudia Carvan.... Didn't You ?

I can't believe I have never seen or ever heard about this film before. To impress a girl at his school, a boy trades in his car for a Jaguar from a crooked second-hand car dealer. It was just a good-spirited, funny and delightful film to watch. I also must admit I loved the fact that I have shot a film at that very car park where the boys work, and it was located on the street I used to live, so I have some personal connection to the locations as well. This aside, it is intelligent, amusing, and keeps the pace going throughout the film.

It was the first leading role for Ben Mendelssohn and a spirited performance by Claudia Karvan. It is also good to see Steve Bisley performance. It can be hard for me to shake his role in Police Rescue and Water Rats, but I have seen him in more and more films recently during his early career, and I have to admit he had a substantial part of building up Australian cinema.

Not a horrible film but nowhere near a classic cinema 10 some reviews would have you believe it is.

Not horrible though, just disposable light weight aussie comedy.