HEIST 88
Starring: Courtney B. Vance, Nican Robinson, Bentley Green, Xavier Clyde, Precious Way, Keith David, and Keesha Sharp
Director: Menhaj Huda
AMARÚ
With a great lead, an interesting story, and a heist to pull off, your film should be close to impossible to fumble. However, as suave and talented as Courtney B. Vance is, there isn’t enough cool to cover Heist 88’s amateur nature. It looks and sounds like a straight-to-video MTV production (which, incidentally, it is). Bad editing, cringeworthy dialogue, and noticeable ADR voice overs stain the few instances when the cast attempts to elevate what they’re given. But when they mess up Nican ROBINSON’s name in the opening credits, the clear lack of budget and oversight sadly make this a really hard watch.
QUENTIN
Even for a person who is incredibly generous when it comes to heist movies, not to mention a fan of Courtney B. Vance, Heist 88 is a complete misfire on nearly every level. I mean, this thing feels like a half-hearted television pilot for network TV that wasn’t picked up, so director Menhaj Huda figured he’d just do reshoots to make it an 84-minute movie, salvaging his time and effort. It looks incredibly cheap, the editing is clunky, and dialogue is rough. Try as he might…and he definitely tries…Vance can’t save this outright disaster.