Band of Robbers

Attempting to adapt Mark Twain's most beloved characters into a modern day story seems like an audacious and terrible idea. But, surprisingly, the indie film "Band of Robbers" manages to pull it off. It has completely captured the essence of the character Tom Sawyer with all of his unrelenting energy, immaturity and imagination. True to form, this 'adult' version of Tom continues to travel through some fantastical version of life, with his every action propelled by a thirst for adventure and glory. In less talented hands Tom might have come off as obnoxious or unrealistic, but Adam Nee is so charming as Tom that he makes you WANT to believe that a person like this can exist. If you have never read Mark Twain's "Tom Sawyer" or "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," you will have no problem jumping in and enjoying this quirky and fun-loving caper. But if you have read the books, you will be all that much more impressed with what writers and directors Aaron and Adam Nee have achieved.

Classic characters from perhaps the greatest literary work of American literature, Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer have hit the big screen, in a re-imagining that takes their mischievously- intentioned, hero-of-the-story selves, keeps a driving plot about finding a mythic treasure, and leaves the rest behind – and to good-spirited, well-earned fun in the new film, 'Band of Robbers'.

It should be stated early, there's not a whole lot that 'Robbers' truly, truly, lifts from Mark Twain's classic novel or characters other than using the characters' likeliness and winning charms to drop them into this new culture mash-up. It's really just the story of a version of a Huck Finn (Kyle Gallner) and a Tom Sawyer (Adam Nee), where Huck is a recent prison release looking to make clean and Tom is a wily cop whose adventure-seeking ways leads to his character's charming but still law-skirting flirtations, and through this all, they still remain the best of friends, along with a band of other self-affirmed misfit pirate pals.

The faces and talents enlisted here are truly where the comedy shines. It has the taste of 21 Jump Street comic-firing and timing of every-line-a-joke (and mostly bulls eye's at that), uses some familiar faces and some not-so, in playing a winning hand. Kyle Gallner as Huck is a Jeremy Renner and Rick Grimes a la The Walking Dead, where Adam Nee is as much as stand- out in a role that he knows so well. The geek-beloved Matthew Gray Gubler as Joe Harper, along with Hannibal Burress as Ben Rogers add a deep bench to the effort, with Burress (and "Greg…Knife" nailing every one of his scenes). Melissa Benoist and Eric Christian Olsen also star as little-used Becky Thatcher, Tom's new partner on the day of the planned heist (mention heist) and Sid Sawyer, beloved detective who plays it maybe a bit too straight.

Written and directed by brother filmmaking team Aaron and Adam Nee, 'Robbers' went through many years of development (including an idea of it being a TV show) before finally having its world premiere at the LA Film Festival. One wonders what following that version of Huck, Tom, and company may have been like, and what many adventures they may have spun in and out of in sit-com fashion. But its final format of a ninety-five-minute feature film feels like the best use of its talent, sparing any over-indulgence in what could have flopped as a gimmick and succeeds as a send-up that breathes fresh life into an American classic.

i saw it at MoA afternoon matinée wed the 20th. perfect setting for an enoyable day this movie was made with passion and tlc--clearly observable.

love to feed the indy movie scene? no put intended. go see Band of Robbers. delightful spin on the old huck fin / tom sawyer story. two seasoned leads did a fantastic job: kyle gallner and adam nee (who was actually in an episode of SatC) who was also co writer and co director.

i'm not usually a big fan of silly movies but i don't pass up mgg. ever. though his role was supporting, his character was hilarious and it was fun to see him play the opposite of reid. plus the short joggers and tank tops are not to miss.

BaR was super cute and entertaining quite a few funny laugh out loud moments. if you need a light airy movie on a cold winter's too hot summer's day, i indeed recommend.

Band of Robbers is a modernized version of the story of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn and makes it more of a gangster story. It follows Tom and Huck as they search for an ancient treasure while that same treasure it been searched for by another man.

Let me start off by saying that I don't actually know the original Tom Sawyer/Huck Finn story, nor did I know that this was a modernization of said story until at least a day after watching it. Regardless, the source material for a movie doesn't affect my opinion of it whatsoever, but it just means that I would have had less of an idea of what was going to happen going in.

Band of Robbers is a fun movie. There was one scene in particular involving an early robbery that made me laugh a little harder than a probably should have. There are a handful of other jokes scattered about, but this scene specifically stood out to me. Also the movie does a great job of balancing both fantasy and realism. The movie's setting is realistic, yet the plot is more of a fantasy with the characters looking for buried treasure. Yet it all fits into the universe very well, nothing about that really feels out of place.

Despite these things this movie is very cliché and a little predictable. It often indulges in a handful of clichés that probably wouldn't have changed the story that much, and simply exist because the average movie watcher expects them to be there. Not all of these scenes were entirely pointless, but without all the things that I liked this movie would be very average.

Overall Band of Robbers is good. There are some very genuine laughs here and there and it manages to blend fantasy and realism very well. It suffers from being cliché and often predictable, but in the grand scheme of things was an enjoyable movie. In the end I would recommend this movie.

Mark Twain fans might be slightly disappointed by the portrayals of their favorite characters but it's best to see it as more as a modern day homage to the books than anything else.

Also a heavy dose of crude humor, it's a comedy of errors first and formost more so than the epic adventures of the books it is inspired by.

Set in present time our dear Huckleberry Finn is a ex con and Tom Sawyer is his childhood friend who ended up becoming a police officer, albeit for no noble reasons.

Kyle Gallner is always good and he is definitely the best actor in this film and delivers a lowkey but very good performance as Huck, Adam Nee is entertaining as Tom but his character is pretty one dimensional... But so are most of the other characters.

After seeing Stephen Lang being absolutely brilliant in 'DON'T BREATHE (2016)' I must say I was a little let down by his (too) mild performance in this one.

But overall the performances are good enough.

There were a couple times where I thought they should have wrote this or that differently in the script but overall the plot is also good enough.

So yeah overall, no masterpiece but... good enough 6.5/10.