The Bank Job says it's based on a true story, proudly proclaiming on its striking retro posters, "The true story of a heist gone wrong. . . in all the right ways." Unlike some movies that make similar claims, like the upcoming 21, The Bank Job doesn’t take too many gross liberties with its foundational truths, such as they are. This much is fact: in 1971, Lloyds Bank on London’s Baker Street was robbed. During the burglary, the criminals’ walkie-talkie communications were overheard by a ham-radio enthusiast. It was the biggest story in town for about a week, until a government-issued D-notice, or gag order, was put in effect and that was the end of it. (The U.K. government denies a D-notice was ever issued.) The bad guys got away with it, and no one ever found out why. Bank Job writers Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais, along with director Roger Donaldson, take these events and spin them into a decent story about amateur crooks, thuggish pornographers, pervy politicians and evil Black Panthers.
Clement and La Franais’ version of events revolve around Terry, played by Jason Statham in patented tough-guy mode, and his gang being unwittingly hired by MI5 to retrieve pornographic photos of a British royal stored in black activist/extortionist pimp Michael X’s safe-deposit box. Statham’s become a regular face in the trashy action genre, but The Bank Job finds him returning to his Guy Ritchie roots as a small-time player in London’s seamy underworld. Statham and his crew make up the best parts of the film, their canned heist-movie dialogue ("The one score that will change everything") delivered with enough charm to keep the tedium of cliché at bay. The rest of the players don’t pull their weight. Peter De Jersey’s Michael X isn’t very threatening, David Suchet’s Lew Vogel comes off as less imposing and more ready for an episode of PBS’ Mystery, and the film’s numerous cops and G-men are just set dressing. Taken as a whole, The Bank Job is decent fluff. The only real knock against it is Roger Donaldson’s failure to pursue the '70s-exploitation trappings so prevalent in the movie’s marketing and first half. It’s more Joe Carnahan than it is Peter Collinson. When the movie focuses on the titular job, it’s great stuff, satisfyingly seedy and exciting. Everything else goes a little wrong and, no, not in all the right ways.