Robbery [DVD]

Robbery is directed by Peter Yates and adapted to screenplay by Yates, Edward Boyd and George Markstein from The Robber's Tale written by Peta Fordham. It stars Stanley Baker, James Booth, Frank Finlay, Joanna Pettet, Barry Foster, William Marlowe, George Sewell and Clinton Greyn. Music is by Johnny Keating and cinematography by Douglas Slocombe.As tough as steel toe capped docker boots, Robbery is a fictionalised take on the Great Train Robbery of 1963 that saw the London to Glasgow mail train stripped of its £2.6 million hold. It was a robbery seen as daring and near genius in its meticulous planning and execution. Coming out just four years after the real event, Peter Yates' film takes the skeleton facts of the real robbery and builds a dramatic carcass around it.Film is structured in three stages, firstly is a scintillating diamond robbery that introduces us to some of the major players in the train robbery to follow. This is fronted by an adrenalin pumping car chase that stands as one of the finest ever put to celluloid, kinetic and with inventive use of camera work, it's set to almost no dialogue and is car choreography of the highest order. Steve McQueen was so impressed he promptly arranged to have Yates summoned to Hollywood to direct Bullit.The second part of the picture and the meaty middle section of the tale, concentrates on the movers and shakers in the robbery. The planning of the event, the gathering of various criminal London factions, their meetings, arguments, frets and worries, even a scenario that sees ringleader Paul Clifton (Baker) arrange to have a currency expert broken out of prison. All the time while this is happening, as the various crooks move about various London locations such as bars, clubs, football grounds and abodes etc, we are also following the police side of things. The kicker here is that the police, led by Inspector George Langdon (Booth), know that something big is being planned, and by who, but they don't know what and have to bite their nails waiting for a break or for the event to actually happen!Finally the third part is the robbery itself and the aftermath involving the robbers hiding out, scattering to the wind as the cops close in. The robbery is edge of the seat brilliance, cunning in its execution and filmed with such gritty realism it really grabs the attention wholesale. The climax played out at a disused airfield is also exciting and such is the fact that previously we have been firmly tuned into the main characters on both sides of the law, we are fully immersed into what will become of them all.Yates and his cast are on fine form, with Baker and Booth excellent, in fact the film positively bristles with British beef at times! Slocombe's photography strips it back to basics, suitably so to imbue that documentary feel, and Keating's score thunders away like a criminal accomplice at times. While fans of 60s London as a period backdrop can't fail to feel well fed after film's end. Pettet's wife of Clifton angle feels under nourished, and the whole middle section inevitably fails to sustain the tempo created by that exhilarating first quarter of film, but small irritants only they be. For Robbery is a British Bulldog of a movie, its biceps bulging, its brain clicking into gear, in short, it's a cracker! 8/10

Obviously inspired by the UK 1963 Great Train Robbery, this a detailed account, beautifully filmed, on location, of a similar heist. For legal reasons at the time, I suspect, this is not a factual account of the actual 1963 robbery, but is VERY similar in many ways. If you like a terrific heist story, a good powerful cast, and stunning filming then you cannot go wrong with his great movie. The HD restoration is perfection!I would loved to have given it 5 stars were it not for the scenes featuring LOUD jazzy screeching brass instruments, mainly saxophones I think, which come into play frequently throughout the film. Unfortunately from the late 50s to the mid 60s jazzy screeching saxophones ruined many a movie.

When released in 1967 this film had a lot going for it! Sadly the DVD confirms that while doing commercially well on release it has not endured well across the years.Stanley Baker then at the top of his acting game used his production company to make the film and got US film financing having been approached by rising producer Michael Deeley ("The Italian Job") and director Peter Yates ("Bullitt") with the story. He enlisted experienced cinematographer Douglas Slocombe (who has only recently died in 2016), popular film and TV composer Johnny Keating and a number of fellow Welsh actors plus other reliable performers from that era (Foster and Finlay) to ensure high overall standards. The script relied on Peta Fordham's popular book on the Great Train Robbery from 1963 and script writers included George Markstein of "Danger Man" & "The Prisoner" fame, so all should have augured well?The DVD quality issues are well documented in other reviews (to which I would add poor audio quality transfer) though it should be noted that a HD DVD with a second DVD of extras (including a German language version!) has recently been released and will one hopes address those concerns. My more major criticism is that the script finally lets the film down. Due to legal concerns the film only uses the actual Great Train Robbery event with the planning build up and the consequences being fictional (there was apparently even a sub plot involving a US criminal mastermind (Jason Robards) which got cut in editing). As a result the much commented on "pre-Bullitt" car chase action and the cast of criminals' backstories has a swinging London feel that just seems slightly OTT and jaded now.The real problem is however in the post robbery story - the leaving alone of a money exchange expert broken out of jail (for reasons never fully explained) to make a traceable phone call and the use by the gang of an airfield post the robbery which the police visit but do not use dogs to search, together with an accomplice who does a runner and is caught with stolen money inside his shirt at the airport (!) starts to destroy any authenticity the preceding action may have built up.By the end, Baker's solo escape as the ringleader to NY as a merchant seaman barely concealed with dyed hair and mustache, having abandoned his wife behind all seems sadly to reflect the script had just run out of energy and the film had run out of time or money (explaining why I will not be buying the latest DVD upgrade of this film).

There may have been a film starring Phil Collins in the title role as Buster in 1988. However, there was one film based on the same events with Stanley Baker in the lead role as one of the gang leaders in the 1963 £2.5m Great Train Robbery. The film is generally good and very colourful but it's main downside was that it's partially fictional and the driver sustaining head injuries in the attack. Nevertheless, it's better than the one starring Phil Collins as it should be of note that there was nothing glamourous about the robbery.