THE TOWN (Rated R for plenty of violence & profanity):
The film says it all at the start, with a statement splashed across the screen, telling us that Charlestown, an area in Boston, has become notorious for having more robberies than any other city of its size - then goes on to show one group of thieves carrying out the first of no less than three cleverly detailed armored car & bank robberies. The robberies and violent use of cars, trucks & powerful weaponry - including some exciting chases down Boston's ultra narrow streets - top everything else in this movie.
Ben Affleck revealed his established familiarity with the city all the way back to "Good Will Hunting; here, as director, he brings the city into prominence the way some films draw attention to, say, the Bronx. And I don't mean just the long shots & action scenes around North Church, Bunker Hill Monument, Fenway Park, & more. The familiar "Pahk the cah" dialect is also there, but softened to a gentle "r" while such details as the obvious wearing of crosses, popular among the Irish Catholics, reminds us of their religious & ethnic pride.
The focus is on the group's crime activities, the first of which is complicated when one of them, Doug (Affleck), takes it on himself to search out the bank's manager Claire (Rebecca Hall) to determine her role in a follow-up by the F.B.I. plan to solve the bank job. Jim (Jeremy Renner) is ready to rub her out, but Doug opts to handle her in his own way - by befriending and eventually bedding her in what appears to escalate into a loving relationship.
Doug is a smooth character, capable of brutal action during the heists yet soft & sensitive with Claire. His expressions reveal little as if he wears a defensive mask, careful to reveal little of what he really thinks. His life of crime is, as with most of his friends, all he knows; his father's in prison and he seems destined to follow him eventually. At present he performs with 100% effort in their capers.
The story hops between the Doug/Claire relationship and the behind-the-scenes F.B.I. work with agent Adam Frawley (Jon Hamm) leaning on Claire to get what he can to Doug and the gang.
Tensions are high, and get even higher as the guys are into a big heist at Fenway Park, there trapped by the police, forced to fight their way out - no gas bombs & pistols, but bigtime war weaponry, vehicles included, to the final chase, to Doug/Claire disclosures, to a wrap-up, all nice & secure.
Affleck has made a lot of right decisions in making this film. Dialog is strong (with only a few improv scenes that go emotionally over the top), the choice of cast (with the exception of the ubiquitous too-beautiful whore with a heart), the feel of local color and the action from South Boston to the crime scenes in North Boston - all adding up to an exciting action flick worth seeing; certainly it's notches above the general run of the mill stuff normally pouring out of Tinseltown. Clever touches, like the wearing of rubber masks (as nuns in one case), with carefully detailed capers (destroying CCTV evidence by tossing tapes into a microwave oven) and the obligatory male/female situation - all add up to 125-minutes of fairly solid drama. (Grade: A- )
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