Most people when they hear the name
Robert Redford, think of his work in the 70’s “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance
Kid”, “The Great Gatsby”, “All the President’s Men”, “The Sting” or probably
his most memorable performance as Roy Hobbs in “The Natural”. What few remember or even know about is this
under-the-radar gem of a film from 1992 with a brilliant ensemble cast
including Redford called “Sneakers”. It
follows a ragtag group of former FBI and former criminals who as a secretary in
one of the opening scenes puts it “So people hire you to break into their
places, so no one can break into their places?”
Redford exhales, “It’s a living.” as she hands him his check for doing a
job, “Not a very good one.” This scene sums
up his teams place in the world. A world
that gets much bigger as they reluctantly take on a job for the NSA (National
Security Agency) where they steal a little black box that holds a chip that
turns out to be the ultimate code-breaker.
On the team
are veterans like Sidney Poitier, Dan Aykroyd, who are constantly going back
and forth as the conspiracy nut and former fed.
And great underused actors like David Strathairn and River Phoenix in
one of his last roles. Every one of the
crew gets a moment or two to shine, as each one brings something to the team. Though most of the moments are humorous, and while
the tension is never full blown, it’s enough to keep you intrigued, and it’s
enjoyable to watch the actors work. I don’t
recall ever seeing Redford have this much fun with a character as he does with
his Martin Bishop character. There are
also some pretty good performances by Timothy Busfield, Mary McDonnell, and the
great Stephen Tobolowsky as Werner Brandes the most memorable name in the
film. And of course, not to be left out,
the creepily awesome performance by Ben Kingsley. The film is a great caper with espionage, governments
within governments, fantastic music by James Horner featuring Branford Marsalis,
and it shows the power of the information that controls our everyday existence,
back in 1992?! Did I also mention the great
cast?
The film also
has one of my favorite verbal-jousting-matches of a climax involving Redford
and the villain of the piece as they go back and forth about who is in the
right, it even borders on heartbreaking.
It feels ina lot of ways like a real Mr. Fantastic/Dr.Doom moment (It
always comes back to comics). The film
was eventually out done about nine years later by the super cool “Ocean’s
Eleven” however “Sneakers” still holds a special place in my heart as a fun
film with many memorable moments and quotable lines. If you’ve never seen it, go on Amazon, buy it
for less than two bucks and give it a watch.
--Robert L. Castillo
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