Jack Foley (George Clooney) a professional bank robber, strides
out of an office building in a bad mood. He pulls off his tie and spies a bank
right across the street. He goes inside and robs the place without even using a
gun. Walking up to the teller, he informs her that a man who is seated with one
of the bank managers is his partner. And his partner will kill the bank manager
if she doesn’t do everything that Foley tells her to do. Foley instructs her to
smile, so it won’t look as if she’s being robbed, and to not give him the last
bill at the bottom of each slot in the cash drawer. When the teller gives him
what he wants, Foley walks over to the man seated at the manager’s desk and
makes a friendly comment on how the teller who served him is a very nice girl.
As Foley leaves the bank, the guy sits there wondering who the hell he was. A
much richer man, Foley goes to his car, turns the ignition, and nothing happens.
The car has died on him, and as he frantically tries to get it to start, a pair
of armed bank guards grab him with the loot.
Welcome to the free-wheeling, stylish world of author Elmore Leonard, where a
suave, debonair man like Jack Foley can have a really bad day. Yet Foley always
manages to make the most of a bad situation and rise to the top, even while in
jail. Getting wind of a prison escape, Foley warns a guard. However, he holds
back crucial information--namely which prisoners are making the escape--until he
meets with the guard alone in the prison chapel. Once there, he knocks out the
guard, grabs his uniform, and goes through the escape tunnel the prisoners have
dug, pretending to be a prison guard giving chase. Meeting up outside with his
friend and partner Buddy (Ving Rhames) Foley runs into another problem: Federal
Marshall Karen Sisco (Jennifer Lopez), who just happens to be in the prison
parking lot on business. Despite her best efforts to foul up Foley’s escape,
Sisco is taken hostage and goes for an intimate ride with the escaped inmate in
the trunk of her own car.
What follows is a sort of well-mannered game of cat and mouse between Foley and
Sisco, which is ably served by the sparks set off by the film’s two leads.
Clooney is great as the easy-going Foley, a thief with a code of ethics who
matches wits with the sultry Sisco. I’ve always thought Jennifer Lopez was a far
better actress than some critics gave her credit for, and Out Of Sight is a
perfect example of her talent. She more than holds her own with Clooney and the
rest of the great cast, which includes Rhames; Albert Brooks as a multi-millionaire
who did time in prison with Foley; Catherine Keener as Foley’s
ex-wife; Dennis Farina as Sisco’s over-protective father and Don Cheadle as
Maurice "Snoopy" Miller, a psychotic boxer wannabe who serves as the main
villain of the film. Michael Keaton and Samuel L. Jackson also provide some
great cameos, with Keaton reprising Ray Nicolette, a character he played in
Jackie Brown.
Director Steven Soderbergh does a marvelous job juggling all the
elements of Leonard’s original story, which was superbly adapted by screenwriter
Scott Frank. The result is an intelligent and genuinely funny film that rings
true. The DVD features a great commentary by Soderbergh and Frank, where they
dissect the film and even discuss things they should have done. There are
deleted scenes, music cues, and ‘Inside Out Of Sight’ a well-done 25 minute
documentary on the making of the movie that has interviews with the cast and
crew. Sadly, this modern crime/comedy masterpiece wasn’t a huge hit at the box
office, yet this is really what home video was made for: to discover cinematic
gems like Out Of Sight.
--SF
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