The Thieves

A Korean heist film set in Macau. Popie runs a crew. There are four of them and they do small jobs in Seoul. Macao Park comes back. He is a former partner and brings an offer: there is a diamond in a casino vault in Macau. For the job they join a Chinese crew. That makes ten people, and nobody trusts anybody. From there the film is a story of preparation. A hotel, a floor plan, camera angles, a lift shaft and ropes. On the day the robbery starts as planned. Then one of the crews begins running its own account. What the narrative is interested in is not the diamond but an old score: something happened years ago between Macao Park and one of his crew, and the whole plan is really built on it. There are a great many characters and the film uses that as an opportunity rather than a problem; everyone has a separate purpose and none of them is explained. The last section takes place on the face of an apartment block. A fight that moves from window to window on ropes, and the best constructed sequence in the film. The narrative builds a bridge between Korean and Chinese cinema; the actors come from two countries and three languages are spoken. The film did extraordinary business in Korea and entered the ranks of the country's most watched productions. Kim Yun-seok, Kim Hye-soo, Lee Jung-jae, Jun Ji-hyun and Simon Yam are in the cast. Choi Dong-hoon wrote and directed. Who it is for: anyone who likes heist films with a crowded cast. Who it is not for: anyone looking for a plot that is easy to follow; there are ten characters and the first half hour goes on learning names.