Coin Heist

There are enough things inherent in "Coin Heist" that it really shouldn't work. The plot is outlandish, the ending descends into schmaltz, and (at heart) it's a teen coming-of-age drama (not like there are any of those floating around these days). However, despite all the unevenness and clichés, "Coin Heist" still manages to at least be entertaining due to the great acting and slickness of the setup.

For a basic plot summary (no spoilers), "Coin Heist" sees Jason (Alex Saxon) struggling with the reality that his father has been stealing from his high school's endowment, leaving the father in prison and the school in danger of shutting down. After a field trip to the U.S. mint, however, Jason's friend Alice (Alexis G. Zall), a hacker at heart and in skill, devises a plan to infiltrate the mint and print some rare coins that can be sold to save the school. The plan will only work, however, if they can also rope in organization queen Dakota (Sasha Pieterse) and outsider Benny (Jay Walker).

For the first half or so of "Coin Heist", I was invested in the characters and their mission. The producers do a great job of setting up the backgrounds of each character, and I really felt like they could be real high-schoolers. Sure, their mission is highly improbable, but that's what cinema is all about, right?!

The problem, however, is that after that roughly half-way point my investment really started to wane for two reasons:

1. The build-up to the caper was much more interesting than the caper itself; and 2. I felt that the ending descending into a bit too much hijinx and corniness for my liking. I realize this is a film directed at teens, so perhaps it plays a bit better to that demographic, but for an older viewer it seemed like a bit of a letdown to build up these great characters and then have them, in most cases, succumb to the tropes of the genre I was afraid would happen from the get-go.

So, while I can easily give "Coin Heist" a slightly-better-than-average 6 out of 10 stars here, I feel that it failed to take that "next step" into the greatness range due to its "running out of steam" in the latter portion. The target audience (teens) may disagree with me here, of course.

A Netflix production that fails to impress on literally every aspect of filmmaking. It's script is at times cheesy, doesn't make sense (why discuss a teenage crush in the middle of a robbery?) and the entire middle segment of the story is boring as hell. The directing isn't much better either. Some awkward shots and blocking in there. And the acting ranges from poor to mediocre. We watched this one with the family (40,38,13,11 years old). Not one of us enjoyed it.

"Coin Heist" has so much potential given the premise. Four students endeavor to save their school financially by breaking into a US government mint and producing "error" coins that can be sold for millions. As it turns out, the father of one of these students embezzled $10M from the school's endowment fund, necessitating the operation.

Given the interesting and promising premise, this film could have been so much better. Instead, it is bogged down with horrible and banal dialogue that takes the audience nowhere. Also, there are scenes that are downright silly--the US government mint's only security seems to be two inept guards at the front desk and nothing else. Four teens can wander around the mint in this post 9/11 world without being questioned or even noticed. There doesn't even appear to be any cameras in place. How convenient, if you're a teen wanting to rob the place. There are also overly done stereotypes, the black kid from the wrong side of the tracks who is harassed by the rich white kid and the angst-ridden computer nerd.

Overall, the cast does a pretty good job with the material they are given; they are believable in their roles. Unfortunately, they are mired in a movie that just doesn't work.

The film itself is not that bad to have such a low rating. I mean, yeah, it's not a masterpiece and we can guess the ending from the very beginning, but do you really expect it to be something extraonrdinary? The original idea was great, although the plot has faults, it's naive and unreal, sure, but it's still an enjoyable movie. Also the characters didn't have the developpement they needed. Like they show the premise for it but then the ending doesn't show any consequences. In my opinion it was a bit too short and rushed. All in all, if you want a real deep suspence drama then I don't recommend it. But if you just want to see an OK film without much moral, drama and serousness, then it may suit very well.

The story was so overly simple and not exciting in the least. The acting was on par with what you'd expect with this kind of movie. It was just a hard watch.