Movie reviews from the UP staff



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Going In Style-

The movie begins with three best friends who all worked at the same factory for 30 years only to find out their pensions have been frozen by the same bank that’s been scamming the elderly. The group consist of Joe (Michael Caine), Willie (Morgan Freeman) and Albert (Alan Arkin). This movie is a remake of the 1970’s classic. The remake keeps to the main theme of what it means to grow old in America and how the younger generations forget about the people who created the America that they know and live in. Living social security check to check is killing these three men to the extent where they eat dog food for a while because it’s cheaper than ‘human’ food. Becoming fed up the men decide to rob a bank. This is no random bank, it’s the bank that froze their pension plans and refinanced Joe’s home.

Finding a way to rob a bank comes with it’s challenges as the trio find when they meet, Christopher Lloyd’s Milton, a die hard Bingo player at the local Knights club who’s a real hoot. What makes this movie funnier is that it is directed by J.D. from Scrubs (Zach Braff). He did a great job with complex scenes while properly giving a modern twist to the 1979 original.

The scenes leading up to the robbery grabs the audience as soon as Michael Caine’s character Joe, tells the branch manager with a classic British accent, “Can I speak to someone smarter?” Yet this remake differs from the others because of how able bodied they make the men. The original characters held up their local bank and barely knew how to load a handful of revolvers.

Not Morgan Freeman.

After three best friends decide to only take what the bank stole from, they learn from a professional who would get a quarter of the share from their heist. The quote is “It’s a culture’s responsibility to take care of their elderly,” and he says while bending down to Michael Caine, Joe, who sees the bank robber’s neck tattoo. Tribe Called Quest even gets played in a medicinal facility, leaving Joe & Willie riding around New York with their heads out of the windows like stoned dogs. Putting their heads together to get out of a sticky situation, the three men don the masks of the Rat Pack and decide to truly go out in style.

Grade: B

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