Based on the true story of the Baker Street robbery of Lloyds Bank in London in 1971, The Bank Job stars Jason Statham as the head of a band of petty thieves who get in over their heads when an old friend (Saffron Burrows) convinces them to take an irresistibly lucrative job. The job entails robbing the safe deposit box room of the bank, which contains not only money, but also documents and photographs that put powerful governmental and criminal elements in compromising positions if exposed. It’s a tense and taut heist caper in which the stakes are high and the consequences are deadly… literally.
Directed by Roger Donaldson with a screenplay by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais, The Bank Job is a hot looking movie, with faithful production design by Gavin Bocquet.
With the story set in 1971, it could have been real clownish with sets, cars and clothes that hit us over the head with “period.” Costume designer Odile Dicks-Mireaux thoughtfully spares us with such gimmicky indication, going with judicious splashes of late 1960s hipsterism with a lot of timeless choices. The way to design a period piece from the last century is to consider that real people in the story’s time were still under the influence of hair and clothing styles from many years prior. Ms. Dicks-Mireaux nails it, particularly with Jason Statham and with the men in M.I.5, all of whom look almost period-less in their suits.
Though it is a tough movie with a real story to tell, The Bank Job has flourishes of great humor and badass style that make it even more thrilling to watch.
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