Today’s quick review: Larceny. Former DEA agent Jack Smiley (Dolph Lundgren) has a plan to steal $20 million from Capitan (Luis Gatica), Mexico’s most notorious drug kingpin. Jack manages to get himself arrested and taken to the prison where Capitan hides his money. But even with the help of his crew (Jocelyn Osorio, Eddie J. Fernandez, and Isaac C. Singleton, Jr.) and his former boss (Corbin Bernsen), getting back out again proves to be a challenge.
Larceny is a budget action movie about an elaborate attempt to steal a fortune from the head of a drug cartel. Larceny aims to be a movie full of clever ruses, shocking betrayals, and hard-hitting action. However, it falls far short of its ambition. The plot is too linear to be an effective heist, the twists are ineffectual, and the prison angle is inconsequential. Larceny fares somewhat better with its action, but even then it only does the basics.
Larceny’s main problem is that it lacks impact. The story beats that are meant to impress the viewer tend to drift by without leaving an impression. The reasons vary from scene to scene—the script, the presentation, the delivery—and are never major filmmaking errors. But the small mistakes add up quickly, sapping the film of its momentum and ensuring that its promised payoff never comes. The result is an action movie that simply fails to excite.
Larceny may be palatable for fans of the budget action genre, but even among that field it doesn’t stand out. Its fights are short and generic, Dolph Lundgren’s performance is sluggish, and the handful of good ideas the movie has it wastes with lackluster execution. Larceny avoids the worst mistakes of its genre, but it has very few positive qualities in its favor. As such, most viewers would be better off looking elsewhere.
For a more inventive movie about an American thief in a Mexican prison, try Get the Gringo. For a more violent fight against a drug cartel, try Sicario.
3.4 out of 10 on IMDB. I give it a 4.0 for weak execution of a mediocre plot, without much action to compensate.