Throw out your preconceptions of bank heist films and you have a good start on "Henry's Crime". This one is a left-field success. The story isn't at all remarkable, other than it was imagined and realized. The thing that makes this flick fly is the fantastic performances. No one is acting, they're just being really low-key engaging. This makes the parts greater than the whole. You've seen some great movies with James Caan, but did you expect another now? I've sensed Keanu Reeves could use his "stiffness" to great effect if something which depended on that came along and this is it. Add some rich flavor with Vera Farmiga and a slight undercurrent of comedy and director Malcolm Venille delivers just the right end result.
This bank heist film is more a comedic love story than anything
And, it works. A slacker, who is actually happy married and going nowhere, becomes a witless victim of circumstance. While in prison he is told he has to have a dream or his life is meaningless. Once more circumstance intervenes and he realizes what he has longed for is the meaning life has once its shared. The trouble is that he is a bit slow to come to that realization and the dream he imagined, that being a bank robbery without violence, really isn't his dream at all. The whole thing is juxtaposed by his becoming an actor, the suitor, in Chekhov's play "The Orchard Thief". Again, low-key brilliance.
This movie entertains first and foremost. It passes as if it is ten minutes due to the uniformly excellent performances of the cast. The direction gets out of the way and there isn't any need for any special effects or senseless action. It ends in the best possible way as to not try to tie up anything past the found love between two people. Simply put, entertaining low-key brilliant thus highly recommended.
