Very Cool!!!

A Disappointing Continuation

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

George Fowler, a bright kid planning to go to college, agrees to join a gang of crooks in order to rob a bank in St. Louis. His friend & fellow robber, Gino, is due to be sent to jail in three weeks time for an unrelated crime & plans to make this his last heist. He is also the brother of Ann, George's former girlfriend. They case the bank & make preparations to rob it. But Ann, who is emotionally unstable following her break-up with George, begins to suspect that her brother & former boyfriend are up to robbing banks & decides to secretly sabotage their efforts by writing a warning on the bank's window in lipstick. When the leader of the gang, the psychotic John Egan, finds out, he kills Ann & forces George to take a more direct role in the robbery. But the heist ends up a spectacular failure.This crime thriller from 1959 is based on a true story about a violent bank robbery that took place in the US & stars several of the real-life participants of the incident, mainly the police officers who attended & foiled the real-life robbery. The film uses a novel approach to make the film about the lives of the robbers in the week leading up to the robbery & the dangerous complications that upended it.But while the film has a robust formula & the actors give consistently good performances, particularly Molly McCarthy as Steve McQueen's unstable former girlfriend, the film ultimately staggers due to a lack of purpose. Most of the film consists of character-driven melodrama over the gang's priorities & Ann's fragile mental state, but this is ultimately nothing more than padding for the robbery. And when the robbery does come, it is somewhat a disappointment due to the lack of time it takes up & ends up feeling anticlimactic. If you're a fan of Steve McQueen, this might do passably well as one of the actor's early credits but as far as heist films go, it is decidedly average.

I like film noirs that are stylish, witty and fun -- like the Maltese Falcon, Double Indemnity, and Out of the Past. They may not represent reality, but they do create an alternate world that is enticing and one you want to visit -- even if only for 90 minutes at a time.The Great Saint Louis Bank Robbery chooses to focus on the gritty, grimy side of crime in an effort to seem more "realistic". It may be closer to the truth than the stylized noirs of the 40's but it is also much less entertaining. The dialog is boring, the acting contrived (McQueen is trying so hard to be the next Brando or James Dean and it's just painful to watch), and the plot so predictable.For a movie like this to work, you have to sympathize with a least one of the characters and I couldn't. Three of the four leads were certifiable mental cases and the other one was dumb as a stump.For a much better heist noir, try KC Confidential or the Asphalt Jungle...

I tuned this in to catch a glimpse of early Steve McQueen. I stayed to watch it. The scenes of St. Louis were very interesting from a historic point of view. So much attention on the cars and the buildings -- this is an accidental snapshot in time. Steve McQueen grabs the attention as very angst ridden about his decisions, seemingly being drawn in a bad situation inch by inch. His girlfriend, although encouraging him to stay on the right path, also abets by funding the duo and not going to the police. Although not a well-known film, overall the acting and the dialog is quite natural. I can see why there is question of a homosexual relationship -- but in those days, hotels/motels were frequently not much more than a tiny bedroom with a double bed and a common bathroom down the hall. Kids frequently slept 2 or 3 to a bed and it wasn't uncommon for adults to share beds to save money.

A very realistic heist film that is based on an actual crime and uses as a location the bank where the robbery took place.The makers of this film were very professional and did a good job. The only downside to the movie is that it is so sombre; the characters aren't charismatic, witty, or cheerful, and they aren't in the habit of saying things like "Do you feel lucky?" or "Make my day." (On the other hand, that fact adds to the realism.)Steve McQueen performs well, and he's not trying to be Marlon Brando. His character is a young, inexperienced man just out of college who's not too sure of himself and who is trying not to become a habitual criminal.Since the film is in the public domain, a high-resolution copy can be downloaded here: http://www.archive.org/details/Saint_Louis_Bank_Robbery