There's a revealing moment in the not-very-good high-tech heist movie "Entrapment" when, after the usual infiltration of a fortress-like bank, Catherine Zeta-Jones sits down at a terminal to make a vast illicit transfer of funds. Old-fashioned cat-burglar Sean Connery looks mildly grumpy and says he preferred it when he could handle the huge pile of gold bullion he was stealing rather than go through all this cyber jiggery-pokery.
In the last decade, it's been impossible to watch a thriller without feeling Connery has got it right. How many suspense scenes have you seen which involve someone trying to copy computer data onto a disc or altering the files on an evil company's hard drive? Think of "Sneakers", "Hackers", "Mission: Impossible", "Eraser", "Charlie's Angels", and dozens of others. Next up is "Swordfish", with hacker Hugh Jackman employed by spook John Travolta to help siphon billions of dollars out of government slush fund bank accounts.
The problem with this sub-genre is not that audiences don't understand the computer stuff (there's usually a large animated screen menu to explain to the thickies exactly what's happening), or that we all assume real-life computer geniuses have bottoms more like Wayne Knight ("Jurassic Park") than Sandra Bullock ("The Net"), or that every super-genius' personal codeword is guessable by a hero within three tries, but that watching someone typing isn't inherently exciting. "Mission: Impossible" has Tom Cruise do his data theft while dangling from the ceiling, while "Swordfish" always forces Jackman to crack code against the clock while distracted by a hooker under the table, a cutting edge album tie-in soundtrack tune, or Halle Berry strangling on a noose. Cruise got away with it, but Jackman is stuck in the 'that's not clever, that's silly' mode.
This year's big heist picture is a remake of "Ocean's 11". Let's hope Steven Soderbergh and his new Rat Pack don't update the casino-robbing plot so the loot is electronic. Like poor old Sean Connery, we want to see the money.
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