Sat 19 Nov 2016
A Crime Caper Movie Review: BANK SHOT (1974).
Posted by Steve under Crime Films , Reviews[5] Comments
BANK SHOT. United Artists, 1974. George C. Scott (as Walter Upjohn Ballentine), Joanna Cassidy, Sorrell Booke, G. Wood, Clifton James, Bob Balaban, Bibi Osterwald, Frank McRae, Don Calfa. Based on the novel by Donald E. Westlake. Director: Gower Champion.
The names have been changed to protect … who? In the book the leader of a hapless gang of crooks who try to rob a bank by stealing the whole bank is named John Dortmunder, whose exploits filled the pages of several of Donald Westlake’s comic crime novels, with emphasis on the “comic.”
Why he becomes Walter Upjohn Ballentine in the movie is a mystery to me, one that I’m hoping that someone reading this will come along and explain.
And while you’re at it, tell me why someone thought George C. Scott has any business playing Dortmunder. I just don’t see it, even with the bushiest caterpillar eyebrows you’ve ever seen on a big time movie star.
Let me explain about the bank. It’s only a temporary one — a trailer filled with guards overnight, but just begging to be put on wheels and towed away. The movie was intended to be a comedy, but I found myself very quietly not laughing almost all the way through. I permitted myself a few smiles now and again — Scott is a very good actor, and while I don’t believe he did comedies very often, once in a while the perpetrators of this movie came up with a scene that worked.
See this for the presence of brassy redhead Joanna Cassidy, whose character is financing the deal and who is (unaccountably) madly in lust with Walter Upjohn Ballentine. The rest of the cast, a motley crew at best, I could easily have done without.
November 19th, 2016 at 7:09 pm
Gower Champion should have stuck with choreography.
Not to mention Scott’s offensive effeminate business because his character was given saltpeter in prison.
Zero laughs, zero charm, I hope they paid Westlake well.
November 19th, 2016 at 9:31 pm
In an interview, Donald Westlake said that the makers of this movie didn’t want anyone to think that it was a sequel to The Hot Rock – even though it was.
At this point, Westlake was past caring what nitwit producers did with his stuff (once the check cleared); he said he suggested “Ballentine” as a substitute for “Dortmunder”, both being popular brands of beer in New York State (Iust as well, GCScott’s character could’ve ended up as “Rheingold” …).
Since Bank Shot, there have been at least three more pseudo-Dortmunder movies, each one a bigger botch than the last, mainly due to industrial-strength miscasting.
In each case, Don Westlake took the money and wrote another book, which may be the healthy approach to the whole business.
November 19th, 2016 at 9:39 pm
I heard that the movie versions of Dortmunder were not supposed to have the Dortmunder name except the first one, The Hot Rock, but any beer brand names, such as Ballantine. Dortmunder is the name of beers made in Dortmund in Germany. I forgot the names of other “Dortmunders” in “Jimmy the Kid” and “What’s the Worst That Could Happen?” at the moment, sorry.
November 19th, 2016 at 10:40 pm
Brands of beer. It never occurred to me. Than\ks, guys!
November 20th, 2016 at 7:55 am
In JIMMY THE KID, the character was called John Dortmunder and was played by Paul Le Mat.
In WHAT’S THE WORST THAT CAN HAPPEN?, which I haven’t seem, Martin Lawrence played “Kevin Caffery,” which has nothing to do with beer.