Inside Man gets an outside audience.

Rating: 8/10 (26 March 2006)

It's nice to see Spike Lee back in film-making. It's even nicer to see he can actually do a mainstream film without shoving the race card every two minutes like he does in his repertoire. Also, it shows he has the skill to handle a big budget movie with skilled actors in every type of character role.
The Inside Man is a movie with a typical bank robbery plot but the scripting, camera shots, dialog and unusual plot twist in the end gives this movie a big thumbs up. Intelligently written, fast paced real life dialog, cutaway shots, and duel cameras on actors from both directions highlight this film and creates the intensity required in a small space thriller. A lot longer than it should at 129 minutes, Spike Lee's skill as a director pieces together current and flash forward scenes right from the get go to hook the audience in what should have been a typical 'bank robbery go wry' second rate TV movie.
Denzel Washington, Jodie Foster, Willem Dafoe, Clive Owen, Christopher Plummer, et al, portray characters who get caught up in a bank robbery at Manhatten Trust. A bank that is chaired by CEO Christopher Plummer who has a secret to hide and hires Jodie Foster to diffuse the situation and get that secret out of the safety deposit box before the robbers snatch it. Apparently, he helped the Nazi's during WWII against his own people (Jews) and used the blood money to set up the bank. The downside is he could be charged with war crimes and lose everything if the evidence is found. Hence, the power broking from Foster on his behalf of Plummer's character ad Clive Owen's Dalton Russell, the bank robber. Denzel plays the second rate cop who is forced to handle the hostage negotiations because his predecessor suddenly isn't available. Willem Dafoe plays the head of the tactical squad used to bring the muscle to stop the robbers. Clive Owen does an excellent job as the masked hidden bank robber who is always one step ahead of the detectives (mainly due to a hidden bug).
Overall, it is an excellently executed affair on what would be a typical bank robbing plot. Much of this is due to first-time screen writer, Russell Gewirtz, and the unexpected twist in the film's climax. Spike Lee's experience as an indie type filmmaker can be seen with his unique piecing of the script through flash forwards mixed in with current plot development. His skill as a director in use of camera angles, dual cameras, motion shots, cutaways, and spacing of time kept the film intriguing and suspenseful in what was a dull bank setting. It's best to see this film in a wide screen cinema to get a sense of what Lee is trying to accomplish rather than viewing the future DVD. My only compliant was the movie took too long to get to its conclusion.
Rating: 8/10